back to office basketball

I dont play by the way, I always just shoot.

After almost a year of not being there to take their photos during their weekly games, I finally made it back to Guadalupe to shoot. This time around, there are more new faces, more players, new uniforms and a different digital camera for me.

Buddy had a dose of SPL basketball last Tuesday...and it wasnt easy. Even at my highest ISO setting (1600..so the photos are mighty grainy) , I could only get shutter speeds of 1/50... gotta save up for a flash!

Some of the photos are posted below.


take two 

move 

Gift

I dont think I've ever posted this on my blog, but its something that I return to every so often whenever I need to feel calm, hope, hopelessness, peace and turmoil all at the same time. I can't explain it, but this poem almost always comforts me.

The author is J. Neil Garcia, a filipino poet/writer and this is taken from his book "Sorrows of Water".


The rhythm that hears me
this day is the sea's:
salt-borne, choking with weed
and oysters, the movement
of piscean shapes weaving water
far as the eye can see.
And I am back
amid the repeating waves off Pamilacan:
the vessel bearing me
is little else but desire,
a density much heavier
than our earth's liquid nature-
its only choice is to float.
It is not stillness I am seeking from this ocean,
but its pain:
a violence of forms
in this sweep of appearances--
flashes of fish flying,
herons and somersaulting terns,
the handsome heads of cetaceans rising
from abyssmal depths, even
the glint of shark-fins,
slicing the horizon like quick
knives. Life caught
in the maw
of its own consumption:
permeable, as though we all
are designed to pass through
each other like food--
plankfon sifting
into the fine-tooth-comb
of baleen, sunlight
rippling past riptides
to reach the sightless bottom
of rock.
And you are everywhere
evern as you are nowhere
in touch, for here is the place
things cherished are laid bare in--
the edge of body's knowing,
the edge of the world.
And I know my task
for the day
is no different from the tide's:
to take in and let go,
to push against land and
pull away, to love you without claims.
for nothing given is ever owned, and ghosts
we already are
of fickle matter's imaginings.
I told you I am yours for the kill--
I can never take it back.
Let this gift pass through
the self's fictive openings,
allow it brief residence someplace
in the soul.
True: not even the sea can hold us.
But listen:
its real bequest is not loss,
it is transformation--
glass fished out
from among a shore's brittle ruins
is never quite glass
but a muted shard of water:
all the ocean pressed against the palm.
An empty shell, a grainy piece of coral.
The gift is yours
to keep or not to.
I can no more reclaim it
than the sea disown its salt--
for, love, how do you
unbreathe
a breath?

making a mess of things

How is it possible that things can go from good to bad, in just a few days?
A few days ago, I was thankful for the friendship...and a few days later, I messed it up.
I only have myself to blame.

Thank you

For the first time since I got back I actually feel like I still belong.

Thank you for taking time out to just hang, and make me remember what its like to be here, to be home. All this time, it was what I was looking for. That feeling of someone wanting to take me back home, bring me back to where I used to be and then show me how and what has changed since then.

I'm so glad I have a friend like you.

Pick Lit: Veronika Decides To Die

Seeing that I no longer feel complete nowadays if I am not in the middle of reading a book, I figured I'd share my chosen literatures and post them on my blog.

The title does sound a bit morbid, but its very appropriate. It is basically that (at least as far as where I'm at)...Veronika puts matters into her own hands, commits suicide --- and fails.

It seems ironic though, that her last act in life is also her first conscious real effort at deciding and choosing to do something with her life. Her reason for wanting death was because her life had become routine and that she isn't about to experience anything new. Strangely enough, when she survives, she begins to discover that there is more to life than she originally thought...and she begins to feel...and she needed to be in a mental institution in order to know that there might still be something to live for.

I have yet to finish the novel and as early as now I can tell its not like my typical fiction fare. Written without any attempts at suspense (it is after all, not a mystery) it's goal is to provoke contemplation and to encourage curiousity. What happens after her failed suicide? Was her reason reason enough in the first place? If I were her, would I have the same mind-set?

Not for the non book reader, and not for those easily saddened / repulsed / turned-off by thoughts on life, death and existence either.

My Horoscope for today says:

This is likely to be a busy day for you. You will feel a bit like a social
butterfly as you flit from group to group. Pay special attention to anyone new
in your life. All signs are that you are going to meet someone, most likely a
man, who will have a tremendous impact on your life. Hmmmm, who do you think it
could be? Keep your eyes open for a stranger in your midst!

At half past five in the afternoon, there doesn't seem to be any sign of any mysterious stranger...sure I subscribe to these daily Horoscope things, but there's a reason why I don't believe them.

Oh well...this made me smile though. Its not everyday someone (or something) tells you you're about to meet someone special.

Confession

Its not really a secret, but I don't disclose it readily... I once was a big Guns N' Roses fan. Yes, I was.

I donned the black jeans, white/black shirt, silver medallion, multiple silver rings look that was so prevalent back in my High School days. I don't know where it is now, but I know I have one of those GNR shirts. Not the cheesy shirt versions of the posters you buy for 50 or 100 bucks on the sidewalk. Its one of those "logos" that they have...it was a heart wrapped in thorns or something to that effect.

I have all their albums (save for a cd copy of Lies, don't know why I never got around to buying one..), I had copies of Hit Parader, Circus and whatever US Rock magazine I can get my hands on. I even have a Laserdisc copy of their "Making the Video" documentaries on "November Rain" and "Don't Cry" (which are 'on loan' from teedge).

Why do I bring all of this up? Velvet Revolver.

Don't know if they're any good....I'll try and get my hands on a copy and see...

Quick blog...

I saw Cold Mountain just this weekend and I kicked myself for not watching it sooner. Its exactly the kind of film I like, it makes sense, its not dragging and its haunting....

I'm sure there are other films out there that I haven't seen which are sure to be good...I wonder if Spiderman (1 and 2) is part of that list? Yeah...I haven't seen those films either!

oh well.