Fall

The low humming of the air conditioning unit reverberated my head as my alarm slowly began to make sense in this word of senseless chaos. As the dull light of Sol shines past the curtains of my bleak and full life. I see to myself to peer out of the curtains slightly to see that he has hidden his face from this world with his tears falling down to the very earth I stood on. The image of the gray sky littered with heavy clouds filled with the sadness of the world that traveled to here from yonder gave me things to ponder about the wonders of this world we live in. But most importantly, with the rain pouring down.

The sporadic rain of a blazing summer is over; and nobody wants to fall in love in the coldness of winter. With her lie in april long gone and done, fall has risen and so shall I; letting go of a fleeting memory that has passed me by. Carried by the breeze into the distant lands, may she never return to haunt me back.

With the end of this afternoon's rain, the sun finally peeks behind its cover and shines a ray of gentle warmth. Not too hot on my skin to burn me, but not cold enough to bring me back to December.

What a fucking life.

I wonder what shall I do for today?

Looking past the horizon of my window, I've heard from my aunt that there were new buildings in town. It's been years since I've last walked and traveled the streets. With the rise and fall of buildings, surely there must be new things to go out and explore with. A mall would be one of the things I should probably go to. Considering I have nothing to eat.

Do I settle for something fast food? Something canned and filled with preservatives? Maybe something fresh from the land, air, and sea? Oh what shall I cook or eat? So many options yet so little money, time, and energy to really do anything.

I should probably get going, lest I get swallowed by my head again. Sometimes it's annoying to deal with the loudness of your inner voice. The eternal conflict occurring deep within one's subconscious as the id and superego fight for dominance in the decision you'll make in your day to day life. Whoever wins must prioritize one over the other: the benefit of the self, or validation from others. Either way, both are selfish actions that only end up suiting the one who made the action to create a decision.

Maybe the answer to this question of what I should eat lies after I had my morning coffee. I can think better when caffeine runs through my blood; the sweet, creamy, and acidic taste of coffee mixed with sugar, creamer, and milk paired with my crackers or freshly baked bread from the bakery that's down the street.

It's never too late for a cup of coffee.

—

For the first time in my life, I rode a new type of transportation. Not too big to be considered a bus, but not too old and traditional to be called a jeepney. A black sheep of the transportation system in this country that symbolizes modernity at the cost of those that it replaced. The air conditioning unit inside is making the glasses on the bridge of my nose fog up with each breath I took. The seat was cushioned and comfortable and luckily for me it was rather late in the afternoon for anybody to be going where I am heading.

Where am I even heading?

The mall sounds great right about now that the rain has returned bringing a soft torrent of rain down to the ground, but there are also new destinations that my aunt told me about. Like the local museum or the one famous historical landmark that I've never visited despite the number of years I've stayed here.

The background feels like a fleeting memory. Everything that this vehicle passes by, a house, a tree, a peaceful passerby minding their own life; all of these feel as if they were pulled straight out of my vast and expansive imagination. The thin line between the wonders of reality and the bizarre rules of a fictitious story that I have been wanting to write for so damn long is slowly becoming smaller and smaller the more days I spend back to my place of origin.

Life in the big, vast, and bustling city, the capital of the state, is nothing short of miserable. You spend each waking day of your life constantly on the edge in order to even survive and get the basic necessities that one requires in their day-to-day life. Then there's the anxiety of being stabbed, robbed, molested, kidnapped, and drugged on your way to the place where you need to go; the high cost of living paired with a small minimum wage that's not enough to feed the common worker. But here, in the safety of the province. Crime is basically nonexistent. Life is hard, but peaceful and quiet. Resilient and Tenacious in their ability to toil the daily struggles of life, but conservative in their beliefs. Such is the stark difference of life between two different places in the same nation in the same part of this world.

As my thoughts slowly enter into a deep state of meditative brooding, the large and looming building of the Mall has finally come into view. Surrounded by rice paddies, right smack dab in the middle of a countryside city; this gargantuan building of steel and concrete is out of place for a city that's mostly well suited to be surrounded by nature. But that's the course of civilization, to develop and accommodate the ever growing needs of a population that wants more and more with the limited resources that we have on this planet. As the vehicle, whom I have learned is called a shuttle, enters the terminal. The presence of people in this structure that recently opened was outrageously tremendous. It's as if a quarter of the entire population of the province collectively decided to go into this one place in the center of it all.

Stepping out of the shuttle, staring into the crowd of people swarming into the entrance of the mall, the loud and bustling sounds of cars, tricycles, buses, and jeepneys all wanting to load and unload their passengers as the sudden rush of people cannot keep up with the limited space of the crossings. The soft glare of the now peering sun that brushed the clouds away with the strong winds of the monsoon season has grazed the pieces of exposed skin on my body as I decided on my plan of action.

With hunger, curiosity, and the desperate need of groceries and new toiletries forming in my mind, I head into the crowd with a feeling of uneasiness and intrigue. Hands in my pockets grasping both my phone and wallet separately, I began to wade into the crowd hoping to not bump or touch shoulders with others. For once in the past three years, I have no genuine worries about being stabbed, robbed, or even molested. There's just something intrinsically different with people from the countryside that really makes me feel safe and somewhat individualistic.

With music blasting in my earphones, the first thing my brain was set too was to find a suitable eating experience.

Surely it can't be that bad? Right?

The sounds of a bustling crowd carrying murmurs and whispers as they walk pass by me standing beside the low mixture of pink and violet neon lights of an arcade. The scenes of life from childhood, to teenage romance, and up to the concept of family lingers all around me as I stand in this little corner and spot simply observing the flow of time in a world so vastly different than the one I just got out of. Students from the local university and high school and their friends and significant others, all laughing and walking around trying to find refuge from the constant hassle of everyday life by escaping the fabric of reality with the people around them.

What a shame.

With each passing second.

I grow envious of the youth nowadays.

The fast food chain in the mall was packed with students looking for a cheap and quick fix of their hunger; though having the means to afford a higher end restaurant, I just couldn't justify to myself spending that large amount of money for a meal that'll only last me for a single day. It would be something akin to financial suicide, though flowing money is great for the economy it'll be the ruin of my own personal bank accounts if my spending habits aren't justified by rational thinking. Damn this mind of mine is always rational in the face of daily decisions but indecisive when it comes to other things.

I didn't bring a lot of money with me today, just enough to get myself some food and groceries in order to at least live comfortably for about a week before walking to the nearest ATM to withdraw some of my personal stash. Man how I miss not being able to worry about all these things.

As I took a moment to take a breath in this corner of mine before I continued on to look for a place to eat, there seemed to be a young couple beside me playing a claw machine game.

"You dumbass, I don't even know how to play this game." she spat.

The guy simply inched closer beside her and placed his hands above hers, before saying:

"Here, I'll teach you."

"First you hold it tightly," then the claw moves before going down and grabbing the brown bear and reeling it in.

"Then you never let go."

I immediately left with an inaudible sigh.

I guess I'm not hungry after all.