Rusty

If I had a dog, maybe that’s what I could name him. But for now, I’d have to let “rusty” refer to me. (Rusty for "getting rusty with my writing")
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It’s been a couple of weeks since I last posted an entry in this space.For once in my entire bloglife (which spans to almost two years now), I have decided to deliberately keep my thoughts to myself. In retrospect, that wasn't too hard. But I miss blogging. So here are the other B-s on my mind lately.

Brownies.
Baking has now become a part of my weekly activities. I've gone back to old-school oven cooking and I'm enjoying it again. Most of my finished products make it with me to the office where I distribute them to my officemates. More than one has told me I shoud sell them but I decline. I absolutely have no business sense. So they, in turn, offer to sell them for me. I just laugh it off. It's like grace. People should just take the brownie when I give it. But what if I tell them I accept donations? Hmm...nah.:)

Blind date.
I agreed to go on one. Prior to my "yes-ing", I've been hearing contemporaries say that it should be treated like any other social exercise. And so, when the opportunity (more like a risk, if you ask me) presented itself, I felt extra brave and said yes to a friend whose friend referred me to her friend. First time. I haven't done this yet in my entire life (I don't count the time when a couple invited me for dinner and some other single guy just happened to be there). Now, honestly, I'm feeling jittery about it. Does every social exercise have to be this nerve-wracking? I'm psyching myself that I'll just do this for the experience in the same way some other adventurous person would try his hand at bungee-jumping for once in his life.

Bunny.
I once had a puppy whom I named Bunny. He was all-white, cute and tame. The day he was given to me, I held him on my lap and treated him as if he was the most precious thing in the world. The next day, I think he forgot all about me and started to bark at and bite me. Hard as I try, I can't remember anymore what happened to him.

Now, speaking of dogs, yes, Rusty sounds like a good name. But I'm not getting a dog anytime soon. Apart from the fact that I have zero dog-caring skills, I don't think I could let a creature with four legs tug at my heart and break it when he dies or forgets about me. My heart can handle only so much heartache.

So Rusty? I'll take that name. But I don't want this name for so long. With one or ninety-nine readers, I'll try to post entries on my blog more frequently again. Rusty sounds too masculine a name for me.

the curse of being an Eve

I start this post with no idea how it's going to end. My only motivation for blogging tonight is the thought that visited me this afternoon while enduring mild stomach cramps.

Salty. I need to eat something salty. Oh, the curse of being an Eve!

Do men ever get stabbed by out-of-nowhere desire for something salty, spicy or sweet? Do they ever get especially touchy and irritable some days of the month for no particular reason at all--with life being presumably normal? Did Adam ever tell Eve, "Oh honey, I'm depressed. Cain and Abel are fighting, and the stress is showing on my skin. I'm going to go out for a while and have a haircut. Maybe it'll make me feel better"?

Shopping--another estrogen-propelled instinct. We women have a shopping chip embedded in our pituitary gland that the scientists have long ignored or dismissed only as a potentially hazardous quirk. In fact, it was activated the moment the first female strolled in the lush garden named Eden. She might have whispered to herself after one lunch, "All Adam ever gives me is this fruit to eat. Maybe I should go and inspect the trees and see what other fruit varieties look and taste good (the shopping instinct kicks in for the first time)." Enter the serpent, the smooth-talking salesman with a tongue of poison who lured Eve into thinking she was getting a good deal with another fruit. Eve, as we all know, got a rotten fruit and a rotten deal.

The consequences of the first sin aside, my point here is why we women like shopping. We are inclined to do it in the same way, say, men are inclined to eat voraciously(or replace italicized word with another male-specific activity that might fit). I realized I have this shopping chip real bad just recently. While strolling with another Eve in Glorieta one night, I suggested we head to Breadtalk. She asks, "Are you buying?" "No," I answer. "I just want to see the breads." Seriously.

Window-shopping for breads? Uhm, yes, but they're nice-looking breads! And they smell good and I like cooking and...I'm full. I don't want to buy any. I just want to look at the breads (You can stop shaking your head in disbelief now. Just imagine I'm window-shopping for shoes).

Before this deteriorates into becoming a completely useless post, let me tell you what's difficult about being an Eve, biblically speaking:

"To the woman he [God] said, 'I will greatly increase your pains in childbearing; with pain you will give birth to your children. Your desire will be for your husband and he will rule over you. (Genesis 3:16)'"

Most women generally find their value in relationships than in their achievements. A woman feels most fulfilled when she's beside her man, or while caring for her kids, or while nurturing any other human being, for that matter. And this is what's hard about being an Eve: When she sometimes feels a longing for Adam and she doesn't know where he is.