from America

Just got back from Lake Tahoe, where my uncle married, by my count, for the fourth time. I'm happy for the guy, and I like the new wife, my new aunt. Even if I stepped on her gown's trail while taking photos, and heard a rip. My bad, but to be fair, it was a small rip, more heard than seen.

Tahoe during this time of the year was beautiful, but I was without Internet for this crucial weekend of the NBA draft and the deaths of MJ and Farah Fawcett. I'm back in San Francisco now, and the unread items on my reader is stressing me out.

Anyway, my trip is finally winding down. In two days I board a plane that will finally take me home. Home is Manila, Philippines, an incomparable place in every way possible. I want Manila humidity, smog and traffic. I seriously do. I also want the uneven comfort of my own bed.

As usual, I am overthinking and figuring out how I feel about this whole trip. The NYC leg was all about me. It was me doing what I wanted to do, hanging with who I wanted to see, staying at wherever I wanted to stay. NCY was, and will always be, great.

This whole West Coast leg was about family, however, and all the baggage that comes with it. The whole experience of spending extended amounts of time with family in close quarters is Kafkaesque in its absurdity, Dante Alighieric in its pain, and Apatowish in its heartfelt humor.

There are many stories from here. About how my relatives made it here and how they adjusted to the way of life. One family first landed in Michigan, and lasted in all that cold for about a year. They decided to go west to San Francisco and rejoiced when, after crossing the hills and plains, they finally saw the city. That city turned out to be Sacramento. It was such a frontier story, I forgot it happened in the late 80's.

Also my uncle (another one, not the guy married many times over) was so pissed about migrating to America that, within the first few months of living here (well, Michigan), he decided he wanted to go back home to the Philippines. That he planned to do it after dropping off my cousin at school, and only packing his books, makes me imagine the frustration that led to this very unsuccessful plan.

In this part of America crisscrossed by flyovers and highways, I spent many hours in a car listening to my aunt recount how she met my uncle (the frustrated man) after losing her first love, a guy who, ironically, settled somewhere here in the West Coast. Theirs is a story for the movies.

But in the midst of all that, family has taken root, marriages have grown, and love has been lost and found. New chapters have been written. Complete, full lives have been lived here.

I'm going back home to resume mine, but I'm taking the stories with me.

Away We Go

I made it a point to see Away We Go, the first joint effort of Sam Mendes and the writing team of authors Dave Eggers and Vendela Vida. I came away really liking it despite some reviews that say that it's too quirky for its own good. I saw the quirk; I saw how some people can feel that the movie had caricatures not characters.

I, however, felt the emotional resonance to be strong and true. It may have something to do with me feeling a bit vulnerable and untethered, like the two characters deftly played by John Krasinski and Maya Rudolph. Or that they are also close to me in age. This demographic, the late 20s/early 30s, is still uncharted territory. It's transition time. We move from having our own apartment to planting our roots, from holding a job to choosing our vocation, from having a girlfriend to finding our partner.

Yet, there is no formula. I like the idea that, no matter how much prep work, and no matter how scary, when it comes to things like parenthood, partnership, and life, we will have to wing it and hope for the best.

ferries

I love ferries.

boys and girls in america

Yesterday could have easily been a bad day on this trip of mine. It started off wrong early. But I managed to catch one of my favorite bands, The Hold Steady, in Williamsburg, where I withstood moshing kids and flung beer, to listen to powerful music played by a hard rocking band.

My day ended on Lia's two-seater couch (which I have come to know and love), sleeping in my unbuttoned jeans, drenched in the sweet scent of dried, fermented barley. It was glorious. Life 3274, dead empty existence 304.

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