Do dogs dream of heaven?

Break ins were becoming more common in our area that it prompted my mother to buy another dog. What she came home with was a scraggly, flea-ridden Doberman-German shepherd mutt we eventually named “Whispy.” My mom didn’t consider her for her shameful state, but rather, she was sold almost for nothing because the vendor just wanted to get rid of her and was worried if the poor dog would sell at all.

After an extensive defleaing and cleaning, Whispy showed signs of being an observant and capable guard dog. Despite her small and fragile stature, she was a terror when she barred her fangs at strangers and reserved her loyalty and adoration only to us. She would change her behavior when she realized that a stranger was part of family or a friend based on what she would observe from our behavior. She was great at keeping traveling Jehovah’s witnesses away who were too scared to preach the word of God in the face of this “menacing” wolf.

Cute widdle puppeh!

Since I was rarely allowed to go out even to play with the next door neighbor’s girl, I ended up playing with the dogs instead. Whispy was my favorite even though it was difficult to play tricks on her. She ended up being my confidant and the shoulder to cry on. She became my “first” best friend. She was so fond of me that my mother always had to call me in order for her to obey commands.

One summer evening, I woke up to faint sounds of squealing and Whispy’s distinct whine of worry. I realized that she has started giving birth to puppies before I opened the door outside and alerted my brothers immediately. As soon as we came out, she looked relieved and had two puppies crawling all over the place. She couldn’t help herself and didn’t know if she should look after the two puppies crawling away or deliver the rest of the puppies still in progress. She looked like she was having difficulty delivering the huge pups because of her small frame so my younger brother was assigned the task of keeping the puppies close to her so she didn’t worry about them, and I helped by playing midwife to the puppies being delivered. My older brother held the two other dogs we owned since they caused Whispy to growl protectively over the puppies. In the end, we ended up with five dogs. One was unfortunately still born and looked like a mutant with a giant head. Whispy had a longing look in her face when we took the dead puppy from her but didn’t retaliate. We dug a small grave for the puppy that same day and offered a little prayer for it. We set out milk to a haggard Whispy who looked grateful and set on to nurse the remaining pups.

After some years, Whispy became pregnant again. We were just as excited and spoiled her. One morning I stepped out and called to her as usual but didn’t get a bark or her presence. Furthermore, none of the dogs were responding to the call either. One of her pups actually came to see me, then darted away. When I turned the corner, I saw that they were all gathered at Whispy’s body. I didn’t want to believe it at first because it didn’t look like what I thought it was. She still looked alive except for a few flies flying around her. I came closer to confirm, my heart pounding in my chest. She was dead. I stroked her a few more times just to make sure, still not believing and I felt heartbroken when I hand moved over her swollen belly. She was due only a few more weeks.

I informed my mom right away, clearly keeping my hysteria at bay. I was expecting to be given one of those TV moment pats in the back or even some show of how sorry she was for my loss but I didn’t get any. I watched her order my older brother and an uncle to put her body in a sack and throw it at the creek next door. I kept thinking, “What? Aren’t we going to give her a funeral? She’s been with us for so long and you know how much I adore this dog!” I was told to get out of the way. Not knowing what to do with myself, I resorted to staying in my room, shocked, holding back tears, but crying eventually. It was a beautiful day for her to die. The weather was fine and the sun streamed into the only window that lit my dim room. Everyone in the household treated it like an ordinary day. The dogs were in a state of unrest and had to be kept to keep from distracting my brother and my uncle from moving the body. After some time, I did come out of my room and watched as her body was put into a sack and carried away.

It took me a very long time before I could finally pass the bridge alongside the creek where she was dumped. This was hard to do as it was only a house away from our home so I practically had to cross the street to go around it constantly. It took me three months to finally gain the courage to look down at the creek and look at the sack with her body in it. I didn’t have to look for it since it was still there. I only hoped that she wasn’t in pain and was very happy for the duration of her life with us. The whole ordeal made me wonder how people would feel should I die but this was definitely the beginning of a vague small voice telling me that there is no heaven or hell, only this earth and the life I’m living right now.

I’ve witnessed my mom break down during a previous birthday party I had when she received notification that her older brother in the navy had just passed away from a heart attack. She often spoke fondly of him and we felt much gratitude for his omniscience since he always seemed to be the mysterious figure behind an unexpected present or just the amount of money we needed to get through. For the rest of that celebration, I had mixed feelings of being happy for myself and being sad for my mom. I tried not to smile as my offer of condolence.

I was in 4^th grade when Whispy died. Though I knew there was a huge difference between a human being and a pet dog, I was expecting some kind of speech about life and death from my mom. Anything would have comforted me but I was left to explore that myself. Even though my mom acknowledge us as “mature” kids, I still hoped she would be a bit more attentive to matters such as this. After an unexpected flood, I passed by the creek again to visit her and found that the sack was no longer there.

Several years later, my mother’s mom passed away. The funeral was comparable to a celebrity since I found several strangers, perhaps every occupant of the apartment building she lived in, and distant relatives in attendance. I was “ordered” to do the Eulogy for my grandmother and despite some difficulty with it, did manage to write a decent one. I had to show it to my father for review because just the thought of it made my mother breakdown in tears. In it, I essentially narrated my short correspondence with her when she still had the ability to write letters. She had lovely hand writing and I would talk to her about how the family was doing, my hobbies and stuff I wanted. Despite knowing that her favorite grandchild is my older brother, I was the only one diligent enough to write to her. I shared language misunderstandings we had with her in her later years when her memory started to fail and would order us something in Spanish and forget that we don’t speak that language at all. I think the crowd got the gist of it. They laughed and sighed at the appropriate parts despite my choked delivery as I found myself breaking down. When it was all over, I returned to where my family stood and got a half hug from my mother who thanked me and cried right back in my father’s arms. Throughout the rest of the mass, I grieved alone. I held my tears and felt envious that my mother had my father and my brothers stood close to each other, both heads bowed. My aunt and cousins were in front, I had other distant relatives behind who occasionally patted me in the back for the “wonderful” speech but despite all this, I felt very lonely being the only person within that crowd without a shoulder to cry on. When it was time for the viewing, I found that my grandmother’s body was that of a stranger. It resembled her, but it wasn’t anything like her.

My grandmother’s body reminded me of the death of our neighbor’s daughter in law who died young of cancer. There were perhaps at least 10 people in attendance in her funeral, not including us. We were invited as our neighbor thought of us as her grandchildren since she babysat us and we babysat her grandchildren. The lady who died looked calm and ethereal in her coffin. She didn’t get the chance to live a long, colorful life the way my grandmother did and unfortunately left a beautiful daughter behind.

I don’t know how to mourn. There are many times I’d like to cry hysterically the way they do it in movies but had been trained to avoid this since my mother had a habit of criticizing me for a drama queen when I did. I could never get the routine right despite many elderly relatives dropping dead every year or so. When silently crying to myself wasn’t acceptable either, the only other option available to me was to feel nothing, after all there is heaven, right?

I believe that religion’s first purpose is to answer death. It’s “comforting” to know that an afterlife exists where you can find your loved ones later on. I will never have a dog like Whispy ever again and as a child, it was comforting to “know” that she’ll be the first one to greet me when I die. I don’t think of it that way anymore, I don’t believe there’s anything after I’m gone so I’ve resorted to leaving crafty presents behind to my friends to ensure my immortality.

Will we see all our loved ones in some afterlife? I just couldn’t believe that, no, not after what I’ve seen. Not after the overwhelming response of the crowd that attended my grandmother’s funeral. It wouldn’t have been that big of a deal if they thought they wouldn’t see her again. Not after the unceremonious nature of Whispy’s funeral. Religious or not, there’s that part of us that knows that this is the only life we’ll ever live.

What’s it like to be gay?

“Do you ever wonder how people become homosexual? Were they born that way or do they become that way?” I asked in the dark laying in bed with my best friend who happened to be sleeping over that night. We were around 14 years old when we had this discussion. I have yet to have a boyfriend and wondered what it would be like. My parents made subtle remarks and gestures that they didn’t want me to have one. Not for concentrating in school, not for distraction, not even for worrying about indiscreet behavior and whatnot. They just didn’t want me to have one while the rest of my friends had their own miniature husbands tagging along with them by the leash, arguing with them, throwing their own variations of projectile weapons at each other when they fought.

I had at least one boy who met some of my “ideal” man criteria, but was not worth pursuing as my parents would make life difficult and because I just didn’t have the confidence. I think there was only one girl in our class who managed to start having a relationship with another student. Every girl secretly envied her but publicly derided her. After some time, teachers asked them to break up because their show of public affection was considered indecent. “Indecent” as in loud giggling and constant passing of notes to each other while in class.

So I pondered about homosexuality. Are you born one? Do you become one? Do you decide to be one when you’ve exhausted your wiles and charms trying to seduce the opposite sex? Both my best friend and me lay there pondering whether we could have romantic feelings for each other or another girl. After a very long silence, we burst out laughing. We’re still very good friends to this day and though we “love” each other like sisters, we just couldn’t see each other “that” way.

Other than my mother, I was the only other female in a household of men. My father worked overseas and we had a few uncles living with us. All the other girls in the neighborhood belonged to rich families and either imported their playmates from other rich families or hired nannies to play with them. That left me surrounded with other middle class children which were pretty much boys. This made me behave like a tomboy and my mother secretly encouraged me to dress up in masculine clothing which confuses me as to whether she wanted meant for me to be a boy. I only looked feminine when I was dressed up in my school uniform. I pretty much had no female adult figure to use as a role model since my mother seemed to vilify any feminine concept such as dressing up, make up or doing your hair. Such routines were reserved for special and social occasions or forcing me to fit clothing that she made for commission. There were very many times that I wished I was indeed born a boy since after I got my period, I was pretty much barred from going outside and left to beg my schoolmates to come visit me if I ever wanted to experience any sort of socializing. It seemed that there were a lot of rights and freedom assigned to the male sex that I was not allowed to experience, even something as simple as sports or outdoor exploring. If i wanted to go outside, I had to nag one of my siblings to be my entourage.

When I did eventually start going out with guys much later, I often wondered how my mom would feel if I “explored” homosexuality. She once expressed how it was a grave sin, but that she would love us all the same… with the undertone that we shouldn’t do it because we would burn in eternity in the fiery underbelly of hell. She would still love me even if I disappointed God but we both knew that whether she loved me or not did not matter, only God’s wrath. She went as far as to dissolve a very close relationship between my younger brother and I for fear that playing and being around me too much will cause him to be gay. I had a lot of homosexual friends growing up whom were patronized by my mother. I felt sick when my friends tell me how nice she was since I was the only one aware that it was a front.

I don’t understand anything about homosexuality. All I know is that I am straight as an arrow and like boys a lot. Because of the repressive environment I grew up in, I took to getting cheap thrills from Japanese comics that featured effeminate and attractive looking boy x boy pairings just to satisfy my deprivation. I wonder if Catholic priests who molest little boys feel the same way? In their minds, “God loves children” so they ended up translating that to their own sick variation.

After some years, I got in touch with an old childhood friend who to my surprise is actually a lesbian and ended up living with her then girlfriend. She was still the same old person though it made me wonder if our childhood relationship had any undertones or if she just decided to be a lesbian after many disappointed heterosexual relationships.

I “tried” to read the Bible when I was 10 and gave up because of how difficult it was to follow and read, and because it gave me nightmares after reading Revelations. I only know of snippets from various sources and people that there are certain parts of the Bible that specifically state that homosexuality is forbidden. From everybody else, homosexuality is a sin. Before I was exposed to the concept of “Original Sin,” I thought of sin as conscious bad decisions like stealing, lies, and greed. This made me think that homosexuality was a “choice.”

The message that reached me from the whole of Catholicism is that it’s forbidden to “desire a man” unless it’s to bear children, and especially to desire someone of the same sex because it serves no function. In the whole, it’s saying that you shouldn’t love or desire anything at all and be mindless, docile sheep. In practice, religion isn’t at all about love, passion, charity or all that warm, fuzzy stuff that they preach. Instead, I found apathy by putting religion into practice. Nothing made sense, nothing mattered, nothing except “God.” It’s disturbing to think how you can find a “mate” that you can even stand to sleep with in this ideology… Then again, with apathy, you wouldn’t even think about it and go about the motions to satisfy whatever notion of society and family you retained from the ordeal.

In conclusion, homosexuality seemed more acceptable than any form of birth control. If you were going to commit a grave sin sexual in nature, might as well go for homosexuality. God forbid you practice birth control or unwanted pregnancies to ensure a quality life for any child you do plan to bear. If you fail to reproduce, you better be homosexual.

I’m not of the opinion that homosexuality is bad at all. It just seems like a phenomenon that is natural that for whatever reason was twisted into the context of being unnatural. Religious people just seem to resent it so much because it doesn’t fit in their dogma and because it centers specifically around the desire and affection of an individual and not child bearing. It is criticized precisely because it’s a glaring and public display of selfish desire to adore and love someone OTHER than God. The relationship revolves solely between two people in love. You cannot disguise, pretend or assume their relationship for anything else.

I consider myself a “retarded” female because of my stunted social growth and ignorance of stereotypical feminine wiles, skills and supposed obsessions. The best I can do of a hair do is a sloppy pigtail. I do not know how to use make up. I have a terrible fashion sense and resort to picking whatever is close to what’s displayed on mannequins in clothing stores. I have no desire or interest in jewelry. I limit myself to three sets of shoes: rubber shoes, sandals and black work shoes. I make sure most of my wardrobe match with my only three sets of shoes. But then again, I like dolls and stuffed animals. I’m a pretty good cook. I have a maternal instinct for taking care of animals. I was born female, I can’t help but be female and I can’t imagine myself living any other form of existence. By my great love of dogs, I am attracted to men. I will drool and have fantasies about them. I… love… men…

Francisco D’Anconia, a fictional character in Ayn Rand’s “Atlas Shrugged” said “Love is blind, they say; sex is impervious to reason and mocks the power of all philosophers. But, in fact, a man’s sexual choice is the result and the sum of his fundamental convictions. Tell me what a man finds sexually attractive and I will tell you his entire philosophy of life.”

No Country for Atheists

I tend to hate European movies because they lead you through a very engaging movie and leave you with an ambiguous ending and claim that they want to leave it open ended for the audience to ponder about. I hate these types of movies because they often feel as if the writer couldn’t figure out how to wrap up the loose ends and give you a nice long bullshit speech that it’s supposed to force some kind of pondering on your part as the audience.

So when I saw the ending to the “No Country for Old Men,” It felt really sudden as if they decided to end the movie right in the middle. I highly recommend that you watch this movie if you haven’t yet as it sports the scariest, ruthless and most menacing assassin; and the best modern western I have seen to date. The movie has your usual hero, heroine, the sheriff who wants to do good, and your bad guy. I’m so used and conditioned to expect the hero to save the day and ride out into the sunset with his heroine, the sheriff tipping his hat for a job well done with the villain dead or put behind bars. The movie just ignores the rules and throws them out the window. Everything you expected happens, but doesn’t turn out the way they usually do.

The hero fails to save his heroine.

The hero dies and gets killed by some third party.

The villain chases the hero throughout the movie but doesn’t even get close to getting him.
The sheriff doesn’t even get close to the villain and is always several steps behind and too late.
The sheriff quits.
The bad guy gets away.

After a second viewing and taking in the title, everything made sense and didn’t feel as much of a shock. I was so set on the sheriff to get the villain right after the hero dies right in the middle of the movie and despite several minutes of scenes of the sheriff talking about quitting and talking to his wife about retirement, everything just went past my attention that I failed to see what was really going on. The sheriff was old and tired. He just couldn’t handle the changes going around him. He could not cope.

This made me realize how I might have failed to understand people and ideas in the past that just didn’t register because my mind was conditioned a certain way. If this is the way people are with religion, what steps would it take to help them understand reality?

I was raised Roman Catholic and was very devout. I attended mass without fail every Sunday, I prayed before bed, participated in every religious festival, etcetera. My gradual loss of faith was influenced by my voracious appetite for reading, histories and wondering if life was just a huge pattern of routine traditions. I found Ayn Rand through “The Fountainhead,” and it sealed my “faith,” forever.

Loosing faith is liberating. It is as if you lived your whole life in chains and realized that you can take the shackles off and be free. We’re bombarded our whole lives with double speak so we lose our capacity to think and understand the full impact and meaning of freedom.

Just recently, a lost Amazon tribe was found who had had no contact with the rest of the world. What must television, airplanes, ipods, computers and other modern conveniences and technology be like to them? Can they even comprehend it?

The Lost Rites of Adulthood

In 1995, the song “Tell the World of his love” bombarded radio and television as the official theme song during World Youth Day held in Manila just in time for Pope John Paul II’s visit. One of the Television broadcasts that stuck to me was a sermon about how you aren’t really an “adult” till you’re 40. Even then, it is considered that you’re actually in the “teen” of your life. This was of course, to the appreciative giggles of all the middle-aged and elderly women attending the mass clearly drinking in the flattery.

I was just starting my first year of high school. Though I didn’t have the words, I had an uncomfortable feeling in the back of my mind about not being “grown-up.” Having been raised on television, since to my mother it kept us within sight and safely at home, the promise of being grown-up meant sleeping and waking whenever you wanted to; Pursuing relationships with the opposite sex (gasp!); Choosing and pursuing careers; Having your very own family, the kids, the pets, the home!; To a young, immature mind, taking away the promise of all these felt threatening.

Even then, I always thought that you just grew up eventually. You just did. It was the natural course of life. I knew I was going to get tired of my Barbie dolls, the trolls, pick up sticks or being a tomboy. I thought that once you turned a certain age, just like video games, you gained a skill for using make up, picking outfits, dating, etc and it was ONLY obvious that I was going to find my “hubby” when I turn 21. I would eventually get married and have kids of my own. I was supposed to expect that because that’s what I’ve been told was going to happen to me just like what happened to my mom and her mother before her, and her mother before her…

All this is too complicated to understand and really taken in at that age but slowly it kept bothering me the older I got. I learned that I didn’t “magically” gain the skill to walk on high heels for formal parties and graduation days, nor did I learn how to fix my hair on my own. So much of any previous lessons, trivia and information told to me by every facet of my world only told me what and who I was between the ages of 1 through 13 and 18 and beyond. Was I supposed to remain childlike my whole life?

There is much to be appreciated by the purity and innocence of youth but it shouldn’t be held up on a pedestal as something that should shape our lives. Religion preaches and insists on the state of “unchange.” This explains the obsession with virginity, children, and the fear of progress.

Hence, when a meek guy suddenly approached me one afternoon apologizing for the hooting and teasing of his friends whenever I’m nearby at lunch time, I couldn’t help but feel… let down. For you see, the guy was supposedly in his 30’s and just happened to be looking for a girl like me. He was shy, always walked around hunched as if he didn’t want to be seen, spoke softly, apologized for everything… I always got the impression that I was talking to a fifteen year old whenever he spoke to me. He had the type of behavior that could’ve been considered admirable and respectable for a fifteen year old, but on a grown man looked obscene. Maybe most women prefer the kind of guy you can whip around to do your bidding; or a bad boy you think REALLY has a heart of gold, somewhere, deep inside of him; but aren’t boys supposed to grow up to be men?

We used to have rites of passage that involved dangerous journeys and completions of tasks. Even though we have certain celebrations when we turn a certain age, it doesn’t really mean much except another year added to our mundane lives. We no longer have traditions that really make us feel that we’ve passed childhood and become adults. I’d like to think that it might be unique events that happen to us individually so a uniform “age” is no longer a condition and the sign is passing that test.

It’s disheartening to finally join the ranks of the “grown-up” and find that rarely has anyone really “grown-up” the way you expected them to, “mentally” and “emotionally.” Though you expect friends to keep the same attitudes, you still expect them to “change” a little bit other than changing physically into an “adult.”

I, Woman

Mother’s day is just around the corner and many of us are probably planning a surprise of some kind or looking for the perfect gift that our mothers’ would want. It’s a great chance for us to express gratitude to all the sacrifices, patience and care they’ve given.

Motherhood is the epitome of a Filipino woman’s existence. All daughters are expected to fill this duty at some point in their lives whether they intend to pursue careers or decide to be full time home bodies. The station itself is put up on a pedestal within our culture through the form of the Blessed Virgin Mary. In Mary, beauty and the ideal female image is given an impossible standard that no woman can ever achieve since she is the “only” woman to conceive without losing her “virginity.”

I am not belittling the role of child rearing or domestic life since it is very important essential to a family. Although very rare, there are now men who fill these roles while their wives are the ones who fill the breadwinner role. Though women are blessed with maternal instincts, it is only natural all matters of the home were originally assigned to the female sex. Since that is no longer the case because we now know facts and have knowledge that better explain reproduction and how our bodies and minds function, the roles can be interchangeable and both noble. Animals have to evolve to specialized functions which divide the sexes but humans are social. The more information we know about ourselves, the more flexible the roles are between the sexes.

The fact is, motherhood is a state that any woman can reach if she chooses to. Unfortunately, there are those who simply fill the role because it is their “duty.” It was prescribed and preached to them all their lives but they don’t even understand why they’re unhappy nor want to admit that they are unhappy with motherhood. After all, next to religion, it is blasphemy to speak ill of motherhood itself. An award should be given to those who genuinely are affectionate towards their children and not because it was written on a book, or commanded of them. Many mothers should be celebrated because they did more than their stereotypical caretaking role. Many mothers go on to fill the role of a teacher, a friend and a nurse.

It isn’t for the sake of having the ability to have children that we should stop to praise mothers. It’s to the mothers who willfully decided to bear a child for love and to raise it accordingly that the honors should go to.