and so it could have been a four day long weekend that i would spend somewhere i've never been.. or i could have wasted a day looking at last minute deals on vacation packages and just fly out of here.. or perhaps i could have joined a roadtrip to another city.. or a tour to the next island.. or a bike trip across trestles and lakes.. many things i could have done this weekend, but im choosing to just stay in place.. enjoy the vancouver sun and spend time packing my things for the nth time,

i'm leaving for home in less than two weeks, not the best time to get away from this city especially now that it's all bright and sunny, and back home is grey and typhoon season. but who cares really? i miss my people, i miss my mom who loves me unconditionally, i miss my dogs who think i'm the greatest person on earth, i miss being me, speaking my own language, riding a jeepney, playing around with my brothers, debating about the world with my dad, catching up with old friends who chose to stay.. because in the end, its not about the number of stamps on your passport that counts, nor the amount of people you've talked to from all over the world, nor the different cultures you've immersed yourself into, in the end it all boils down to one thing... i belong to home, home is where my family is, and that is not here.

it's times like these when i need quotes to remind me why i chose to wander.. and here are some of my favorite ones:

“Not all those who wander are lost.” - J. R. R. Tolkien

“Two roads diverged in a wood and I - I took the one less traveled by. And that has made all the difference” - Robert Frost

“The world is a book and those who do not travel read only one page.” - St. Augustine

“For my part, I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel’s sake. The great affair is to move.” - Robert Louis Stevenson

“One’s destination is never a place, but a new way of seeing things.” - Henry Miller

“Do not follow where the path may lead. Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail” - Ralph Waldo Emerson

"Travel Light: Own only what you can carry with you, know language, know countries, know people. Let your memory be your travel bag." - Alexander Solzhenitsyn

“A ship in harbor is safe — but that is not what ships are built for.”
John A. Shedd,

“Life is either a daring adventure or nothing” - Helen Keller

“I have found out that there ain’t no surer way to find out whether you like people or hate them than to travel with them.” - Mark Twain

“If you are not living on the edge you are taking up too much room.” - Howard Jayne

“Look at the stars lighting up the sky: no one of them stays in the same place.” - Seneca

“Somewhere on your journey don’t forget to turn around and enjoy the view”

“Cover the earth, before it covers you.”

there are only 24 hours in one day. too few for all the things i want to do.

let's say an average person sleeps 8 hours a day, and works 8 hours a day, that leaves him only 8 hours to actually do something interesting with his life. ok how about subtract an hour for travelling to and from places you have to go, another hour in total for all the meals you have to take, and give or take another hour to groom yourself. that's only 5 hours left to change the world or appreciate the snow falling on window sills, or marvel at the cherry blossoms. its all about one of those abstract concepts - "money" that will allow me to "buy" stuff that will make me "happy". too many unfathomable words in one sentence, it's giving me a headache. is sleep necessary? well maybe, it gives me energy to wake up the next day and do more work, which will give me money, which will help me buy stuff, which will make me happy. now how about the shuffling from one place to the next, the eating, the grooming, yes they are equally "important" - now even that word lost its meaning for me, well we do need to spend time giving our body nutrients and to keep ourselves presentable and yes getting from wherever "home" is to work and back (most important thing) does require time too.

so what happens if we have to do more work? i cant sacrifice my 5 hours of bliss, something has to give - sleep would be it, what's the use of sleeping 8 hours a day? that's like sleeping a third of your life, a big chunk which you could have contributed to something more worthwhile, and so these days i sleep at most 5 hours a day - i would be lucky to get 40 hours of sleep in a week, i dont want to miss anything this life has to offer. these are the best years of my life, when i can actually walk and run and jump without any aches in my back or shortness in my breath, when i can just fly from one place to the next at the speed of thought, when i could actually do more and be more, now why would i choose to spin in place whenever i have those "free" time for myself?

life is too short, i need to rearrange my perspective if i want to have meaning and relevance. i dont want to be like those people who suddenly wake up and find out that their whole life just flashed before their eyes. work is not equal to life. and so i am so looking forward to going home, and bumming around on an island with no internet, no computers, no iphones, i wonder how long i will last.

today i found out that i needed a dental xray to see how my wisdom tooth is growing, it was hurting so much that half my face was numb and i woke up with a fever. i couldnt sleep nor eat, let alone get up and do anything. i was wasted. funny how one small tooth could render a fully grown human being totally useless. i resolved not to take any ibuprofen, none of that sissy stuff eh? pain, after all, is not the worst thing in the world. (so what is?) feeling something, anything at all, only means you're still alive, and being alive means having hope, hope that the next day will be better than the last.

i'm still a month away from going home, a visit to my dentist is imminent to finally put an end to this misery. extraction would probably hurt tenfold but at least that's temporary. nothing lasts forever anyway, not even pain.