Warning: Lengthy post! Full of metaphors! :p
I haven't gotten out from this asylum of a house in a long while now, that's why I haven't been posting much because I haven't gone through much adventures this week. I regrettably cannot get released from this prison on my own will, because I'm sadly still being held back and owned like a pet that cannot wander out from its cage; living with dependence: a dependence I bear ill will of; a dependence only existing because of money I am not allowed to earn because I might break free from the bonds. I feel my neck and ankles currently being cuffed, and the cuffs are attached to large, long, heavy chains that have a padlock at the end.
And MONEY IS THE KEY.
At times, though, my owners hand me the key if ever I have good enough reasons to be released: reasons that should make them happy, and I have learned -- through the long span of time of my imprisonment -- what seemingly makes them allow me to go without hesitations. Since then, I already made up heaps of alibis that should make them say yes at any cost; I have executed spotless plans and excuses to escape from this dreary tower and from unnecessary trouble, and luckily, almost all of them worked. Though because of my wit and stealthiness I have relished the freedom I've always dreamed of, I was only allowed to taste this fulfilled wish temporarily each day.
Well, albeit that's the case, I have learned many different things in my adventures to the outside world. I finally learned how to buy in stores, ride in tricycles or PUVs, how to avoid talking to strangers, and how not to abuse the addictive privileges that this deceitful, materialistic world offers. All my experiences were not in my owners' knowledge, and everything I have learned were kept secret. I have to pretend to be ignorant and cold as I go on with my chained life.
Years have passed and I still continued all my journeys to the outside world, all of which were strengthened by lies that my owners so stupidly believed and rightfully deserve. I met countless characters that led happy unchained lives though the same dependence bound them to their owners. Their owners were unbearably kind and joyful -- a sight and a fact too hard for me to keep from envying. I then grew accustomed to the unfairness which at first brought me three years of unstoppable tears. I became aware of all the incurable sicknesses of some people's minds and traits that unavoidably affects other people's lives and thinking.
The once beautiful outside world soon became a gloomy land of silent suffering as I trod the places I've never been before. However, I refused to stop my adventures, for in every experience of joy and sorrow, I LEARNED.
In some of my travels, I have also met and befriended people that are treated the way I am -- like pets: chained, controlled, manipulated, and submissive to each of their owner's orders. I sometimes only hear stories of their unfortunate lives from other people. In some cases, they are luckier, yet in some stories I am. The less lucky ones submit themselves and had never tried going out to the world to learn because LYING -- they say -- is something they cannot afford to do. Nevertheless, I say I am less lucky when it comes to the atmosphere of my relationship with my owners, for mine is awful, awkward, therefore hopeless. What usually strikes me with fear when I listen to such stories is the tragic, life-changing mistakes that these chained individuals do due to ignorance. Some take their own lives, run away, have vices get the best of them, or fall in the clutches of teenage pregnancy.
This week, dearest readers, I ran out of lies. It already feels like a century of being locked up. So yesterday, I went out of my own will while my owners were away! It has truly been quite a long time since I visited you, O outside world, and I missed your lovely food! I hurriedly unchained myself, escaped the unlovable tower, and walked down the street with
ripped tights. I had to visit a friend who lives in a far away place I've never gone to, in order to borrow
something.
A typhoon brought incessant rains and soft, unpleasant thunder, but my desire to escape once again was too strong to be stopped. That was my first time travelling ALONE, to a place I did not know where, so I was anxious and excited at the same time.
When I finally got out from the village, I was amazed by everything I have not long seen until then: amazed by the beautiful women walking randomly along the roads, the stores selling secondhand objects, a man wearing a shirt that said "I ONLY DATE HOT MODELS", the passengers I rode with in the PUV, the sites under construction, the fares being passed from a hand to another, the children that annoyed their mothers, and many more. O dreary me, I haven't seen a world teeming with life in a long while! It felt like the first secret adventure all over again: I felt small, shy, and scared, like an ignorant eleven-year-old having a stroll with her friends, without her parents' consent.
I read the directions my friend gave me again, and afterwards realized that I was still too far from my desired destination. I disembarked from the PUV, and was accompanied by ladies in their 40s whom I asked for further detailed directions. They gladly answered and helped, and pointed to what I should ride next. I gratefully followed, but cannot seem to find the right tricycle. I was surprised when some old, kind strangers that helped me find my way. They were strangers, yet they helped a young lost fellow find her way. My owners always taught me that strangers are people who would sell or murder me. But now, I guess, I proved their idea wrong. Not all strangers are not at all diabolical as they told me..
So I finally rode my way to the other city and was to stop by a village across a school.
The sky was dark though the afternoon was young, the roads were dotted with muddy puddles, and the drizzle went on. I was alone and ignorant, and I did not know where I was now wandering around. Around half an hour passed and I still hadn't found "2nd street". I already stopped by a store and asked vendors, approached a passerby, and asked a driver for directions. I barely had enough fare left for me to go back home. But I refused to be afraid. I refused to regret. My God is kind and is always with me. The ignorance and fear my owners have planted in me will soon cease, if I choose to be brave enough.
Hence, I made it.
It was a humble home and my lonely friend prepared peanut butter and jelly for me as I played their piano. There, in that place, I heard her story -- a story which was a bit the same as mine: a chained, submissive life; however her owners were not heartless so she was cheerful despite the unreasonable laws.
Her introductory statement of her feelings caught me:
"I am so unlucky. Here I am, a girl born with an adventurous spirit, kept and locked up here by my family of homebodies."
Her mother had suspiciously stared at me and greeted me with a careful and observant smile before I was admitted in, after I was introduced.
I do understand the dangers and risks that might capture our lives in a bottle of trouble, but I WILL NEVER understand the idiotic intentions of locking up an adventurous soul that will unknowingly get diabolically cursed by IGNORANCE! Surely there are far more creative ways than that!
My visit to her house was not long for a dusky dimness was already painting the already-dark sky, thus I had to leave for home. As I prepared my things, my friend suddenly came to me rejoicing, for because of my visit, she says, she can finally go out of the four corners of her cage even for just a little while. Her owner allowed her to accompany me to a street where I could hitch a PUV for me to ride home.
We walked the streets filled with what seemed to be uneducated strangers, mostly men. We were constantly being called, but we ignored them by indulging ourselves in conversation. A few hundred meters away, she showed me a beach of free entrance as she accompanied me, and we leisurely walked a round in the balcony that looked over the dirty sea. The typhoon's breeze became moderately violent, but we both dismissed this type of warning as a beautiful wind we missed. The gloomy shades that the sky brought was too overwhelming for us to be scared, and our conversation and mutual emotions were too absorbing.
No sooner, she bid goodbye as I got up a PUV, inside of which were whom I guess as the driver's old mother, his wife, and his son. I could not help but listen to them as they conversed. Their sharp, hurtful words toward each other blended well with the characters I observed were surrounding the vehicle; so perverse, fearful, and unkind.
Slowly as the vehicle moved, I heard a choir of angelic voices from a school that me and my friend had passed by from our stroll just a little while ago: a school attended by students from penniless families. My friend told me of their unfortunate lives that was a tad bit too similar to ours: they were kept in by nuns and disciplined hurtfully for the "good" of their future personalities and lives.
As I watched out the window of the PUV, I saw the sadness and the hideousness lurking in the darkness of the dim streets: poverty, thoughtlessness, frustration, and deprivation scattered all over the world of adventures, never disappearing. I became afraid. These exactly existed from under the roof I live in, not as people and scenes, but as chains and hearts...
... of the owners that continue to bind me, for as long as I don't have my own bunch of keys to freedom.
