nickelsodium @nickelsodium - Tumblr Blog

June 18, 2021

The farthest back I can remember that I used writing as a coping mechanism to process emotions and events happening in my life was when I received a purple Harry Potter journal for Christmas in 2002. I was in 3rd grade and I wrote in it religiously. Maybe in one of the boxes of our home in Quezon City, maybe, the thoughts of an 8-year-old me remain preserved.

I moved from traditional diary-keeping to blogging when I graduated from primary school to high school. I had found a new medium in which I could dump my thoughts: the black hole that is the internet. Over the decades, I've probably started and deleted over 20 blogs, always torn between keeping it a personal journal in which I could release my thoughts, and wanting to make it a public persona of sorts. Blogging, as we know it today, was not a thing for influencers yet at the time. It was simply a documentation.

Now, I feel, this blog has become my own little safe corner on the internet. Safe and familiar, and yet, I'm still afraid that someday someone important will find it and think little of me and the vulnerabilities on my digital sanctuary. I guess I haven't really grown out of my uncertainty, after all.

I realize it’s probably been over a year since I’ve been on Tumblr. Maybe it’s time to come back.

It’s been a while.

I feel like I’ve lost my voice somehow. Maybe I’ve been speaking up, fighting back, too often. Maybe that voice is still there.

I’m sure she is.

Maybe.

Funny, isn’t it? We’re taught to defend ourselves when we’re being hurt, to fight back against bullies, to stand for what is right.

Where has that gotten me so far?

Exhausted.

It has led to the discovery that I do not possess the solution to a problem that is not my own. It has led to the conclusion that I feel trapped in a relationship I did not wish to be in the middle of. It has led to a feeling of unrest, not knowing where I belong, if there is even such a place. It has led to helplessness, frustration, defeat, loss of meaning or direction. It has led to self-imposed isolation, to guilt, to anger, to resentment. It has led to being misunderstood, to judgment, to animosity.

It has led to a balancing act of knowing the right words to say, when to say them, and how, in a place where we’re supposed to feel most comfortable. It has led to 5, 10, 15, 30 minutes extended in the car because I don’t want to go inside yet. It has led to wanting to believe that you do all these things out of love but finding that I can’t. That I no longer.

One’s actions must match with one’s words.

Maybe, right now, I’m tired of fighting back. Maybe I’m tired of inconsistencies. Maybe I need to find my voice again. Or maybe losing my voice is part of my process. Maybe I don’t need my voice to fight back.

Maybe you can find ways to silence me but I will find other ways to fight.

That’s one thing you cannot take away from me.

San Juan, La Union July 1-3, 2016

So, do it. Decide. Is this the life you want to live? Is this the person you want to love? Is this the best you can be? Can you be stronger? Kinder? More compassionate? Decide. Breathe in. Breathe out and decide.

Richard Webber, Grey’s Anatomy

For Every Woman by Nancy R. Smith

My father has been very active in our family Viber group with his side of the family- including 4 generations of the family from my grandaunts and grand uncles down to my own nieces and nephews. Yesterday, he shared this as his favorite poem from college:

For every woman who is tired of acting weak when she knows she is strong, there is a man who is tired of appearing strong when he feels vulnerable.

For every woman who is tired of acting dumb, there is a man who is burdened with the constant expectation of knowing everything.

For every woman who is tired of being called “an emotional female”, there is a man who is denied the right to weep and to be gentle.

For every woman who feels “tied down” by her children, there is a man who is denied the full pleasures of shared parenthood.

For every woman who is denied meaningful employment and equal pay, there is a man who must bear full financial responsibility for another human being.

For every woman who was not taught the intricacies of an automobile, there is a man who was not taught the satisfaction of cooking.

For every woman who takes a step toward her own liberation, there is a man who finds the way to freedom has been made a little easier.

I’m overwhelmed at the thought that my father relates to this poem. I wonder what it is that goes through his head when reading this. It’s moments like this that remind me that parents are only human too.

#personal

psych-facts

Let someone love you just the way you are-– as flawed as you might be, as unattractive as you sometimes feel, and as unaccomplished as you think you are. To believe that you must hide all the parts of you that are broken, out of fear that someone else is incapable of loving what is less than perfect, is to believe that sunlight is incapable of entering a broken window and illuminating a dark room.

Marc Hack (via psych-facts)

This is my friend Anna. I promised her a while back that we’d go on a date and I’d take her pictures. She helped me with a project with Bren by being our model. We took studio pictures of a sports apparel brand. Afterward, we walked around the campus to unwind and fulfilled Anna’s happy photoshoot.

Because of this set of pictures, I’ve started to question color space and color models. While on the dashboard, my phone, and as a post draft, the colors look fine, the way I edited them or want them to appear. But on my actual blog, they seem a lot less saturated and have a yellow/green tint. I still haven’t read up on it as much nor have I figured out why it appears that way.

I suppose I’ll eventually have to learn about it!

#photography #portraits #friends #AF

Nope, not ready to leave just yet. #iloilo #philippines #local #travel #beach #water #sky (at Sea Garden Resort)

#local #philippines #sky #water #iloilo #beach #travel

Diway

#photography

Galing at talino. Honor and excellence. Truth and fairness. All for the love. Mabuhay ang mga Iskolar ng Bayan! 💚❤️ #Sablay2015

#sablay2015

First time in SM Aura with the family today. I brought my SLR and 50 out today but when I turned it on I forgot I'd taken out my SD card to transfer pictures from saGuijo. Oops. 😂 iPhone it is then. 😄

#iPhone #photography

The major obstacle for amateur film-makers is their own sense of inferiority vis-a-vis professional productions.The very classification of “amateur” has an apologetic ring. But that very word - from the Latin amator, “lover” - means one who does something for the love of the thing rather for than economic reasons or necessity. And this is the meaning from which the amateur film-maker should take his cue. Instead of envying the script and dialogue writers, the trained actors, the elaborate staffs and sets, the enormous production budgets of the professional film, the amateur should make use of the one great advantage which all professionals envy him, namely, freedom - both artistic and physical.

Maya Deren, “Amateur versus Professional”

#quotes #thoughts