The Pursuit of Happiness

I used to think that to be happy is the ultimate goal in life. Consequently, I thought hurt and sorrow were the evils we must avoid at all costs. It's a bit naive in my part, now that I think about it. Not that these perceptions are wrong, but just not as absolute as I thought they were.

Happiness would lose its meaning if we were constantly happy. There wouldn't be that glory and that want to be happy. At the same time, the feeling of pain would lose its meaning because these are two complimentary emotions that to lose the meaning of one would render the other meaningless as well. Everything would just be the same, if we were brought up to feeling only one side of the spectrum of human emotions because I don't  think we'd discern feelings if that were the case, because we wouldn't be able to identify which is which.

I've new found appreciation for the whole range of human emotions, be it in the good or bad side of the scale. Pleasant emotions make us feel better, make us feel more complete and I still think it's a good idea to strive to be happy. At the same time a lot of emotions are unpleasant and unwanted, but understanding that there's a rainbow because of the rain creates a whole new perspective; we should take in the good and the bad, because life would be more meaningful with both. 

Let's not be picky and take a cue from Forrest Gump, "Life is a box of chocolates, you never know what you're gonna get." 

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Image taken from here.

Only children know what they are looking for.

Of course I wouldn't have understood The Little Prince as thoroughly if I weren't in Ma'am Lalaine's class. I've always considered it a very witty, almost philosophical, book but I didn't extract so much meaning when I first read it several years ago. Now, it's like a whole new different book that I've read especially when our class got to discuss balance. (Update: Love story pala ang The Little Prince, as in more than just the symbolism of the rose. Gosh, I'm dense!)

Simply put, we need balance in our lives. Balance between work and play, balance between greed and service, balance between theory and practice. Grown ups, the little prince said, are only concerned with matters of consequence. It cannot be helped. But what's important is to not get caught up in the oh so important things such as money, politics or golf in order to appreciate sunsets, rain and drawings which are equally important.

We were supposed to write a comparative essay among The Little Prince, The Pearl, and The Giver. I didn't come to think of balance being one of the concepts that these three share. It really struck me how important this is and how I totally missed it, and I've come to realize I find this specifically important because I am afraid to lose the child in me. Very much so. I'm pragmatic and serious most of the time, and I can't help but think I need more poetry in order to see things not just as they are but also what they can be. I'm afraid of being an unbalanced and messed up grown up.

I'll read The Little Prince again after a couple of years, and I'm really curious what I'll pick up then.

There are endless significant lines in the book but I'll end this post with a classic quote:

 L'essentiel est invisible pour les yeux.

What is essential is invisible to the eyes. 

I am a semicolon.

I love my English 11 class. I may not be getting the highest grades, but I am learning so much. Ayos :)

Today we discussed several poems, including Jose Garcia Villa's concrete poems: The Bashful One and The Emperor's New Sonnet. I am totally clueless in poetry, as I have said before, and these two are among the poems in our reading list that I cannot grasp by myself. But today, I have found admiration for concrete poems especially The Bashful One.

Concrete poems are poems that rely on their aesthetic organization to extend their message. Or something like that. The Bashful One is basically a poem that includes a single punctuation mark, a comma is the widely received understanding of the said punctuation mark. (Hay poetry you are in so many levels subjective!) So what does a comma mean? Commas are used to pause, usually for emphasis or division in a sentence. It can mean hesitance, prudence, delay or whatever that may cause discontinuity. But right after the comma, there is always something that follows, a continuation. You can always depend on that.

The Bashful One with the space divided into quadrants.

Now the placement of the comma in the third quadrant, in terms of Cartesian space would render it in the space of negative x and negative y. Going down the literature route of this conjecture, it is in a position where the comma would seem unimportant since the most memorable parts of a piece are usually in the first and last portion or in the top left and bottom right of the space. We read left to right, from top to bottom and the comma is located where one would most likely to miss it. So why in the world would Jose Garcia Villa place the all indispensable comma in a quadrant of little importance? Wala lang.

The bashful one, the comma, is in literal terms the shy little punctuation mark. Let's dissect the title for some more insight. First is the definite article 'the', joined by the adjective 'bashful', and then the indefinite pronoun 'one'. It's almost oxymoronic that the definite article and the indefinite pronoun refer to the same object. The contrast is further enhanced when you take into account the term 'one', which is used here as an indefinite pronoun while it also means singular or unique. These choice of words make you think, what the shy one is shy about or why is it quiet in one corner. It's like the bashful one is really a modest and humble little comma, which is timid and simple yet full of substance because it always follows through. At this point, the bashful one is not just a comma anymore. A poem may refer to a chair, a punctuation mark or a blank space but in the end it's all about humanity, about human nature. Crazy and amazing at the same time.

Before discussion, we were asked if we were a punctuation mark which one would we be.  A majority said they were question marks and a handful declared they were exclamation points. I simply said I think I am a semicolon, because I pause, but then I continue. Oha. Spontaneous answers are the most honest answers, but even I was surprised how my answer came to be. Even more so when we were closing in on The Bashful One when I realized how similar how I felt as a punctuation mark and what that heck of a poem touches on.

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On a side note, my ostentatious and very loud seat mate had a bit of a slap in the face when our teacher concluded that great (read: intelligent, skilled, etc) people are usually quiet and shy. Haha. In yo face!