looking into my own "pieces"

first i feel the cold of the nights hugging our entire place. it's nearly christmas; i can smell it. the sides of the roads towards our place is blinking with lights shaped in angels, contemporary mangers, and stars with pointed tails. schools around the city are getting getting deserted each day, and if you pass by the side of the gates on late afternoons, it's quite magical the way the leaves actually race with the dusty wind. i think the best part of most schools around the country is the green you see within the area. this time though, the green withers more beautifully to light brown. it is the cold winds in the months of october and november that gives the city a fresher touch. the sun does not burn too much, the leaves are scattered, the night lights get shimmer immensely.

next i find myself seated on the bed, wondering how i spent the first quarter of the year.
wondering.
an understatement.
perhaps i spend the time not wondering, but actually immersing myself in the past months, going through them in a blur of faces, dialogues, places, and events. only this time all these things hurt more than they did when they were actually happening. sometimes it disappoints me to realize that the things you most remember are the things worth regretting. why should there be a time for remembering anger, failed expectations, failed goals?
if only the time spent compensates for a bigger ending of a wonderful remake of all the broken pieces.
usually it does not. sometimes it pits me even lower to an ill phase of self-indulgence.
next comes self-loathing.
then self-pity.
the process snatches away the happiness there is in just sitting down with no deadlines to meet, no people to please; the happiness in watching the sky turn black with some streaks of orange; the happiness in simply staying put at home.

and just when i thought i already killed that special strain of happiness, i find myself lying in bed and humming songs, flipping through torn and crumpled sheets of paper, and watching my family sleep.
the songs i hum bring with it a stream of silent testimonies on people and the way they think and the things they feel.
the sheets of paper bring with it the person that i was back at the time when i feverishly held a pen and stroked it in paper.
the act of watching my family sleep brings with it a feel of security i cannot fully describe.
there is after all, some things i can take with me as i lie down at night.