Angel

   Funny how things go upside down in just a few weeks, I didn’t know what went wrong.  Maybe this is what happens to a wife who lives apart from her husband.  I don’t know, but, I may be depressed.

   I can’t explain my melancholia, it’s an all of a sudden gush that almost ate my entirety.  I hardly know myself anymore.  I used to be this strong, assured woman, but now, I don’t know where that woman went, I am like a different person.  Nobody could ever mouth the words "kawawa ka naman" to me coz they know how I hate it when other people take pity on me, but now, I pity myself.

   I know my married life is far from perfect, but I can see how it improved over the months, I have already adjusted to the changes, and I can say that I am pretty happy with how our relationship managed the struggles that life poured out on us.  But I can’t help being down again.  Down because I realized, without my husband, I hardly have a life.

   That’s where self-pity came in.  I don’t know who I am now apart from being a wife to my husband.  Of course I will always be a daughter to my parents, and a sibling to my brothers and sisters, and a friend to my friends.  Don’t get me wrong, I am happy to have these roles.  But my life stops there.  I no longer have a job, I can’t even go far from 2 miles away from our apartment without bugging our friends to come rescue us.  Can’t even enjoy a cup of coffee with a good book at the local cafe. 

   I used to help fight to change the world, but now, I can hardly change the way I live.

It was quite a year from me, a lot of changes, a lot of adjustments, so let me racap my life for the past year.

January

- Came back after a six weeks vacation from the US.

- Resigned from SMART Communications, the company I have worked for, for 4 years and 3 months.  This is my first formal job which I resented during the first half of my stay, but when I was already leaving, my heart couldn’t take the pain, I have grown to love my job and my colleagues that If I didn’t have to leave, am sure to be still working there at this time.

February

- Got married (see my blog at http://www.katecent.blogspot.com).  Getting married was so stressful that I shed off all the weight I gained from vacationing from Nov-Dec 2005.  It was the biggest event I planned in my entire life and I am glad that we pulled it off.  Being married was so overwhelming that I couldn’t help but cry several times from the preparation to the reception. 

March

- Went to our honeymoon of course =).

- Left my country, my life as I was used to it and my family to embrace my new life.  It was the hardest thing I had to do in my 25 years of existence, leaving my country and the way I lived was hard enough, my friends can attest as to how I love my mother land and how happy I am living my life, but leaving my family, it was heartbreaking.  I couldn’t get myself to say my goodbyes, I know it was not permanent, but I love my family so much that I don’t know if I can live 8,000 miles away from them for who knows how long.  In the end, I embraced the fact that I am now married and have a new life ahead of me with the one I love.

-  Started a new life with Bong, my loving husband.  It was hard at the start, a whole new adjustment for me and for both of us.  As we all know, I am not really well known for being a homebody as I can be always seen at the mall, gym or at the cafe.  Somehow I learned to cope with doing household chores and being alone at the apartment during the day except on weekends when my hubby would take me to malls, parks or other tourist spots.

April

- I had a mild depression probably because of the everyday routines of doing nothing but chores, hehe.  Seriously, I had trouble letting go of my life as it was before.

- Hubby and I celebrated our annivesary (boyfriend-girlfriend) at Asheville, NC.

May-June

- celebrated my 1st birthday away from my parents and siblings but I had 2 months of celebrating it as hubby’s bday present, it’s a different way of celebrating my birthday, but it was a very happy one.

July

- I had one of my poems published for the 2nd time in a coffee table book, I was so happy because unlike the 1st time, I was able to buy the book now.

- We moved to another apartment and got so stressed that I gained at least 5 lbs from binging. 

- My sister gave birth to her son, Johan Ezekiel, first pamangkin in our family and we are just so excited to see him when we go home in the Philippines this year.

August-October

- We moved to Shreveport, Louisiana for hubby’s work but left our things behind in Raleigh.  It was a difficult adjust for both of us, the weather was terrible and our first hotel room was so cramped.  Luckily, by mid-September we were able to move to a better hotel.

- Gained 10 lbs. Our 1st hotel didn’t have a kitchen so all we had to eat were microwavable frozen dinners not to mention we oftentimes eat out at Chinese Buffets or Buffets in Casinos which are by the way plentiful in the Shreveport area.

- My sister in law gave birth to her daughter, Izzy, after seven years of waiting, God gave them a gift.

November-December

- We moved back to Raleigh and are now sharing an apartment with Enyel and Irene.

-  Lost 14 lbs probably in the process of moving here and there.

-  Happy to finally be back here in our first home in US with a lovely weather and great friends.

-  Happy to finally have my hubby for the whole two months to myself because he didn’t have project at that time.  He really needed the break from all the stress from work and I am on the verge of losing my sanity from being by myself most of the time.

So there, my 2006 in a not so nutshell… =)

It was a very important year for me, there have been a lot of changes, a lot of adjustments, but what’s important is the lessons I have learned from all of these experiences, and that hubby and I are together.

I know, I know… I haven’t updated in a while…

Alright… it wasn’t just "a while", my last post was…. well, that’s how long it is already…

There have been drastic changes in my life… and we have been busy… busy moving from here and there… until finally, we’re settled…for a year maybe…and after that…who knows…but as for the moment, I’m nestling, in a space we still cannot call our own.