Wednesday, April 24, 2013

Smoke & Mirrors

I haven't written in a while, primarily because life has thrown me a series of curveballs worthy of the most melodramatic of soap operas. I have only recently started to begin putting back the pieces of shattered expectations and dreams around the devastation of the last several months.

My mother passed away on my birthday last year, and while her death was certainly an event that had been on the horizon for a while, the circumstances made it difficult to adequately prepare for.

Today, as I was cleaning my room, I came across a menu for a Korean restaurant here in town; it was a restaurant both my mom and I enjoyed immensely. It's amazing how sometimes your senses conspire to bring forth memories. When I held that menu, bits of a conversation started to come back to me; a conversation that I had recently with a friend, and a conversation I had with my mother before her passing.

In the recent conversation with my friend, we talked about whether life is really worth living when you have to accept significant restrictions to keep living. At what point is enough enough? At what point does the burden of existence become too much to bear?

My mom had a host of health problems over the last several years; many exacerbated by her lack of seeking medical care and taking a measure of personal responsibility for her problems. I watched her decline from the incredible, take- charge woman she was into a stranger I barely knew or understood anymore.

That's not the point though; the point is...that menu. My mom was a diabetic, one who struggled with keeping her blood sugar controlled despite being insulin dependent. One day, after arguing for the millionth time with her about why she couldn't have a package of galletas (Cuban crackers) in her room, she hands me the menu and says to me that she'll treat us both to lunch if I go buy her a soft-shelled crab from the Korean place.

I remember looking at her in disbelief; here I have been doing everything to promote whole grains, and whole wheat breads, and portion control, and moderation, and Mom wants a crab. Not just a crab, but a deep-fried one. I remember turning on my heel after saying no, and leaving her room.

I retreated to mine to think, angry over what I saw as her total lack of attention to her health, over what I saw as her obvious refusal to take care of herself. It was a scene that had played out hundreds of times over the last few years, and I was frustrated.

She never asked me for a soft-shell crab again, and a few months later, Mom died. Today, I found that menu, and I thought, "I should have bought the stupid crab."

I wonder now if my refusal to yield to her was really done in her best interests, or if it was my stubborn refusal to accept that saving her from herself was something that was simply beyond the scope of my abilities; I wonder if my refusal was ultimately the culmination of a selfish wish I had to have a better relationship with her, a wish that never, could never come true.

But most of all, I wonder if she knows I miss her still, and I wonder if she knows I loved her, even if it wasn't possible for us to have the relationship I wanted so much.

I think I will keep that menu...as a reminder that sometimes there is more to life than consequences, as a reminder that things are sometimes more than what they appear to be on the surface.

Monday, December 24, 2012

Reflejos

En silencio hay veces que se aprenden las lecciones mas profundas; es uno de los misterios de la vida que la calma también puede hacer sentir como si uno si estuviera ahogando. Mi alma esta atrapada; encadenada por inquietud. No se lo que me molesta, y estoy tratando de encontrar la solución. En este año que muere, he pasado mucho, derrotes de la vida que me han dejado destrozada y en pedazos, pero aun así no he perdido el animo de seguir. Aun con animo, estoy cansada, perdida. Mi prima siempre dice que una persona debe ser su propio héroe, y es un idea atractiva, pero como puede ser alguien un héroe con un alma fatigada y que no suporta mas? Como seguir sonriendo, cuando lo único que ven tus ojos es la destrucción de todo lo que que creas, de todo que una vez fue tu fortaleza?

Wednesday, November 14, 2012

Olvido

Siéntate junto a mi
Aquí en el jardín de mi soledad,
Te voy a contar la historia de un amor fundido.
Hablemos de promesas hechas, murmullos de amor...
Convertidos en cruel traición.


Una vez no era lo que soy ahora...
Una mujer desencantada
Un alma sufriendo un exilio de calor
Y de cariño...


Una vez caminaba con propósito,
Mis pasos asegurados, fortalecida
En la promesa de amor de aquel que me amaba,
Y que yo también amaba...


No fui siempre el fantasma de tristeza
En cual me han convertido los años
De desilusión, y rabia.


Una vez, sabia como sonreír...
La risa me acompañaba siempre
Y las lagrimas eran lagrimas contentas...
No lagrimas de amargura, de perdida.


Una vez amé con certidumbre, y no la confusión
Que ahora me atrapa y me consume...
Confusión engendrada por un dolor mas fuerte
Que la puñalada mas traicionera.


Una vez fui, pero me olvido...
Me olvido
Me olvido
Me olvide.




Dedicado a las memorias di mi pasado en Noviembre 2012.

Saturday, November 10, 2012

Sola

In broken halls long since bathed by candle glow...
A Lady, walks; besieged by woe
Her step uncertain, her thoughts in disarray
She paces till the night flees the coming of the day

Finding no lasting solace
Her eyes glance to the empty corner
Where once stood he; and is no more
In reaching, she grasps only cold shadows

Longing for warmth and plagued by memories
Once, they were tender mercies
And not the treacherous echo
Of the one she loved, and has let go...

The silence broken by her sobs
She cries till tears no longer come
And the weight of her sorrow
Forces her to walk, again, alone

Tuesday, September 18, 2012

Elegy of the Broken Arrow

The world held its breath
To hear what you had to say;
The silence was heavy when you
Said you could not stay...

We said we were happy for you,
We did not lie; and yet the ground
Was wet with our tears when you
Passed us by...

Your humility as you exited the stage
Was worthy of an epic playwrights' pen, Not the verses of one with Such a hapless quill...

You said to me once...
You didn't know what inspired so many to follow you and follow after...
No matter where you would go;

And I remember saying that you were
A paragon we all aspired to follow and to please; that your trust and Belief in us was priceless and dear;

You said loyalty and respect you Prized above all else, and so we Strived to be a cut above the rest
In word and deed; but it was your vision that made us the best...

But now the arrow lies broken...
The bowstring has gone to dust.
And all that remains is the need
To guard your legacy, and what's
Left of us...

Dedicated to The Prince
17 September 2012

Monday, August 13, 2012

One of my favorite poems, "Invictus," by William Ernest Henley

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds and shall find me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll.
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.


Latin 101: "Invictus" means "unconquered" in Latin.

Monday, August 6, 2012

Gamers Who are Asking for It

In my previous post, I mentioned how I am playing Crystal Saga now,and how I really am enjoying a return to PC gaming as a result. Remember I said CS enables co-op and competitive play?

One of the events that offers an opportunity for competitive play is the Sengolia Battleground event which takes place daily at server times 15:00 and 19:00. The fancy name is meant to hide from noobs the fact that it's like being a really slow guy who manages to catch a football and run to the touchdown zone.

In the middle of avoiding fifty-million people whose sole desire at the moment is to eliminate you in the most efficient and utterly humiliating way possible, you have towers; towers that belong to your faction and to the faction that's opposing you. While you are running around trying not to killed, your job is to destroy your enemies' towers, along with the ultimate fortification, the opposing teams' Crystal of Life.

Anyway, I'm in there fighting on the Spirit side and I noticed that Player X from my previous post and The Prince are on my team. X and The Prince come up with some pretty sweet tactics and another friend goes off to draw Demon threat.

While all this is going on, some lower-level player starts ranting about how Sengolia is rigged; (it's not) the developers have put in place controls that more or less equalize the playing field, probably because they got tired of drinking coffee brewed from noob tears...half the time, I get spanked in Seng too, because my teleport works the wrong way or doesn't work at all.

Anyway, after his ranting about that, he decides to take out his frustration on the Lunar Goddess. Who is on the opposing faction. And a nice person. But still SCARY to meet on a battlefield. I mean, her character's outfit is cute and frilly, but it's like a zombie Minnie Mouse that just keeps coming back. And zombie Minnie Mouse is distracting you with her cuteness so she can fire an arrow of doom right between your eyes...

While I'm pondering this and trying to avoid the Lunar Goddess and The Mightiest Disciple, it occurs to me that this idiot might be the one that appealed to The Plushie King to stop the Goddess from killing him in the Guild Resource Battleground. The Plushie King was not moved by these entreaties, and so the petition for clemency was flatly denied.

The GRB is another PvP event, and you must collect certain resources and transport them to the guild management guy. You have one hour, which is more than enough time to get everything you need even if you do get slaughtered a few times, which happens to everyone...hell, I was in their a few days ago and The Prince yawned in my direction and I died. It happened so fast, I couldn't even figure out how he killed me. I think he flicked a booger on me...but the best part; he whispers me and tells me, "sorry, I pressed the wrong key."

I still managed to complete the thing, even though after my unceremonious death, I scowled at the computer. In the words of the geektastic Wil Wheaton, "Don't be a dick." There really is no need for it and it makes people look stupid and immature.