RETURN OF THE COMEBACK

More than two years have elapsed since I wrote a blog.  I turned 59 then ... and now I have my senior citizen card. 

Days pass too quickly when you reach a certain age.  People of my generation noticed that.  Weeks speed by, then months. Before you know it --- a year has transpired and you ask yourself, "Really? What happened?"

Time moved more slowly when you were younger. Much younger.  There were things you used to do as a kid which at a certain point in time you stopped doing --- and when you decide to do it again, you are shocked to find out that you can't do it any more.  Then you casually shrug and say, "Been there, done that."

It has been years since I found the need to go clubbing on weekends to strike a pose across bars, casually holding a drink and wearing this bored yet interested expression so as not to look over-eager, over-enthusiastic or basically over-the-top.  It has been years since I shook my booty on the dance floor even when they played Madonna because, uh, the kids are saying that even if her career spanned four decades and she held the record of having the most number one songs on the dance charts ---she is still of the generation of their grandparents.

Should I say "Ouch" or simply give them the finger because to have a career spanning that long and being 56 years old and capable of performing the way she does should be proof enough to give her praise and attention. Oh, well --- you know you are of that age when you start saying that 60 is not the age of retirement because that is the biggest misconception ever.

Sixty is when you are old enough to know your mistakes, wise enough not to repeat them again and yet strong enough for a couple more blunders.  

You say been there, done that because you have lived through your own crazy years through the 1970's to the early 1990's.  The kids may have Valkyrie but we had our own temples of joy in our reckless years. And if you think what you do nowadays is wild, you can never imagine what your parents --- and, yes, your grandparents --- did in their heydays in places called Circuit, Where Else?, Delirium, Velvet Slum and Coco Banana when they were your age.

You would be surprised. (Snickering as I write this, really.) What seems to be so oh-wow! to the youth of today is so ... uh, mild ... compared to that generation who boogied until they just couldn't boogie no more.

So I am back not because I will record history or assume posterity. I am merely chronicling such interesting days.  As I said, days passed too quickly since the last time I choked on my adobo.

Since then I assumed another teaching post. I also became the editor-in-chief of a magazine.  I still work out at least four to five times a week but my girth has returned for reasons my doctor called "the triumph of metabolism over determination". And I am still working on films.  

What gives me even greater joy is that I am discovering new writers to find their voices ... not to be Stepford Wives of mammoth studios ... but to be crusaders in film, finding their expression and significance in a field so competitive and yet has become so predictable and banal.


I told myself I will take it easy when I get my Senior Citizen Card.  I think I am doing it all wrong.  And what is worse is, I am enjoying it.

Since October 2013, so many things have happened. And it is time to reassess, review and even reflect on all that has come to pass ... and all the even greater things yet to come.

It is good to be back. Somehow.