A Dose of Prose

Variations on a Theme by Alastair Reid
by Loffy

Curiosity may have killed the cat
more likely, the cat was just unlucky
or else suffering from clinical depression
that went undetected for years
The odd fellows in goggles and lab gowns
never quite found out whether the cat
had crossed the fine line between
genius and lunatic
or was really just curious to see
what death was like.
So the cat's file read "Heart attack"
but it is interesting to note
that the cat had led a healthy lifestyle
and was nowhere near obese.

Nevertheless, to be curious is dangerous enough
To be disillusioned with the comforts of familiarity,
to turn your back on your trusty scratching post
and dependable rubber mouse,
venture into the uncharted and the unknown,
peer into a hundred foot abyss and see
the next great adventure
only to find that you are back where you started.
With curiosity comes hope of finding Something
and the terrible danger of finding Nothing
Perhaps the cat was naive in being an optimist
Always expecting a big bowl of quality cat food
at the end of each dark tunnel
Only to be crushed every time.
Had it expected an army of salivating brutes,
it might not have stung as hard.

Face it. Curiosity will not cause us to die.
But disappointment will.
They say only the curious have, if they live,
a tale worth telling at all
But suppose there is no tale?
Suppose you have gone to hell and back
and the only difference is that
it was a couple of degrees hotter down there?

Dogs say cats love too much
and perhaps they are right.
Cats let their emotions lead them astray;
that is their blessing and their curse.
They are not afraid to be different,
to love until they can not love anymore,
to take a path trodden only by psychiatric patients,
regardless of what the conformist dogs may say.
That is why cats have nine lives
No, it was not awarded to them --
they demanded it, because eight was not enough
In the same way seven was not enough
and six was not enough.

But the awful truth is that
the world is unkind to cats
And that no matter how many lives they lead
the world will never appreciate what they have to offer it.
It is, after all, a dominantly-dog world
where prevails much wagging of incurious heads and tails.

Maybe the cat, lying in the morgue,
had in fact suffered from depression
after years of having the cruel world trample on its dreams
and give in return to its eager curiosity nothing
but stark disappointment
But to give up is an improbable choice
a cat is likely to consider
No, indeed, for a cat never accepts defeat
but spits -- or hacks a furball -- in the face
of those who dare to belittle its genius
if that is the last thing it does.
No, a cat will not take its life to escape,
but to embark on a journey more promising than
the one we have during this lifetime.

Perhaps in death it hopes to finally find
a big bowl of quality cat food.

Experiment One

Today is the day to end all days.

Today marks the triumph of the quest I resolutely embarked on many moons ago, the quest that has taken me to the edge of the earth and back. I have searched high and low and far and wide, never once stopping to rest, and today will go down in history as the day I found it.

A DVD copy of The Motorcycle Diaries. Haha.

I don't know why I even tried looking for a movie like The Motorcycle Diaries in CD stores at the mall, of course they'd have nothing but bigtime Hollywood trash. I thought for sure I'd find it in Quiapo but when I didn't, all hope began to wane. How can anything NOT be in Quiapo? It seemed to defy logic.

But then I found it. And right in Baguio, too. It was in a tiangge/CD/DVD shopping complex at the lower part of Session Road. I forgot the name of the place but it's right next to Dunkin' Donuts and across the street from Pines Studio. Great place. Great selection of movies. The lighting isn't bad either unlike most tiangges although it can get very hot in there in the afternoon. But hey, being baked alive is a small price to pay for all the rockingest CDs and DVDs on this side of the hemisphere.

So why all the trouble for a movie, you ask? Well, obviously you have not yet watched The Motorcycle Diaries, or else you'd be out hunting for a copy yourself. Aside from being an autobiographical account of this century's most shamelessly-plugged revolutionary (and my personal favorite) it stars the sinfully yummy Gael Garcia Bernal. That should be reason enough if your gender preference is male.

Just as I expected, it was no less fascinating than the first time I saw it. The scriptwriting was witty and not one bit trite, the cinematography breathtaking. The story was poignant-inspiring and Gael Garcia Bernal was perfection personified. Bravo, bravo.

Also, while watching the film a thought dawned on me about how Che Guevara is one of the reasons I scribble my name on desks, write blogs and love to have my picture taken. And then I fused this thought with something I've read by Margaret Atwood and came up with a pseudo-theory:

[Warning: Nigel Tufnel-esque philosophizing ahead]

See, many people (myself included) aspire to be what Che Guevara was, and I don't necessarily mean a redneck communist. At the back of every person's mind is the desire to accomplish great feats, "change the world" so to speak, and be someone great someday. But the sad truth is that most of us will not even come close. Most of us will never have our faces emblazoned on t-shirts and caps and coffee mugs that are to be sold to a generation that wouldn't really know who we are and what significant, history-altering feat we have accomplished but will buy all those merchandise anyway.

Most of us will only fade into obscurity after we die and the world will proceed as if we never even existed. Depressing, I know.

So what do we do instead? We immortalize ourselves. We carve our initials into wooden desks and write "so-and-so was here" on the doors of cubicles in public CRs. We create masterpieces. We write journals and blogs and take pictures of ourselves. Anything to prove that we exist -- that we once existed. Because contrary to what some of us might have heard, man's greatest fear is not to be lonely. It's to go unnoticed.

(Do take note of the difference between "lonely" and "unnoticed." The two, however, may not be mutually exclusive. Anyhoo. =P)

People like Che Guevara remind me how difficult it is to become great. You have to be a visionary. You have to have enough courage and determination to break free from the norm, from the dictates of a flawed society. You might even have to take a bullet for your principles.

So is that why I scribble my name on desks, write blogs and love to have my picture taken, because I've given up on my delusions of greatness? Hell, no. Remember what I said about how most people's faces will not find their way to a t-shirt? Given that, the blessed few whose faces will should ensure early on that they indeed have pictures to put on a t-shirt. I want my children and grandchildren to cash in on my fame, you know. Hahaha!

But kidding aside. I guess I immortalize myself for either reasons but also because I'm really just vain. And oh yeah, here's the most important and overlooked tip if you want to become someone great: don't plan it.

Damn, there goes my merchandise.