When I was about 8 or 9, someone very close to me called to confide that their house boy attempted to rape her. Once we told her guardians (her mother left for the United States about a year before the incident) about it, they lost no time in filing a case against the bastard while the two of us just lay in bed, crying in each other's arms.

They say that molestation is the abuser's attempt to gain control but in the process I feel that so much of the victim's self-respect and esteem is attempted to be taken away. I say attempted because nobody can hurt and keep on hurting you unless you allow them to.

For example, the person that I'm talking about is all grown up now and understands that her past doesn't make her any less of the strong and beautiful woman that she is. A factor that contributed greatly to her recovery was the unconditional and relentless support from her loved ones. Much like in Magnificence by Estrella Alfon, more than any aggression or violence against the jerk, it was the comforting company and quiet sympathy of the people around her that helped her move on from the misfortune.

The lead character in Games by Noelle de Jesus insists on taking on different names and personalities when calling her boy up at his work place. Doing so shows that she is reluctant to open up and show who she really is because she thinks that just being herself is not good enough to keep him happy.

She makes up names with corresponding physical features and personal characteristics as a wall to give her a sense of control in the relationship. The imaginary women serve as a wall to keep him at an arm's length away, a safe distance that prevents him from sensing her vulnerability to pain.

But when you try not to get emotionally attached or tangibly committed to something or someone so as not to get hurt, the effort itself shows that the thing or person that you are avoiding matters enough for you to think that it can hurt you. And the thing is, as much as I want to reassure you, nothing is ever for certain. Planes crash into buildings, crap falls from the sky and sometimes, even when you least expect it love breaks down.

No matter how hard we work to make sure that we don't put ourselves in a position to be used and abused, it can still happen. The least we can do is just love as much as we possibly can so at the end, we have no regrets that we didn't give as much as we could because what's worse than burned and bruised is knowing that there could have been something that we could do to keep it together.

Of course, that's easy for me to say but not always to practice. Sometimes when you like somebody so much it's hard not to compare yourself to anybody else like the song that goes:

Suddenly I'm back at the core
Thinking of her who had you before
Were you as good
As good as we are
Do you remember?
Did you love her the way you love me?
Is there a chance that there might be
traces of her that you carry
under the surface?

You know it's silly and stupid and you should know better but you never really do. I guess the thing is, there will always be that element of doubt, the "What if he uses me?", "What if he leaves me?", "What if I'm just not pretty/sexy/insert complimentary adjective here enough?" and what have you but like I tried to state earlier, it's all a matter of how you deal with it. So you're not as flawless as you would like to be, but face it, who is? Accept the reality that we all have our you own little faults and it's no big deal. What's more, as hard as it may be for you to believe, IF YOU LET THEM, someone can love you, just the way you are (imperfections and all).

Edit: so I just realized I had to compare canon and contemporary writers so here goes nothing. Off the bat, what I really noticed is that while the former talk at length about the person and his place in the society, contemporary writers often just write about the insecurity that lies within. I think this quote from the movie (not the book, but the screen play for it) Fight Club sums up modern short stories well:


We have no Great War, no Great Depression. Our great war is a spiritual war. Our great depression is our lives.

Labels: Alfon, de Jesus, litfili week 5