Well, it seems that 2013 is just looming around and 2012 is nearly at its end. There were a lot of things happened this year that highlighted my 43rd year of existence. Things had come and go and so with 2012. We tend to bury everything into oblivion and just handpicked something to be remembered. For me I am just giving my soulful insight about the entire year in retrospection.
January was not a fresh start for me. After having a grand vacation in Europe and Mexico the previous year, on November and December 2011 respectively, I have to face my battle for the unexpected burglary that had happened in November when I was still in Italy. It seems that the court battle against the sole perpetrator who did it was very gruelling but I am not losing my composure and confidence. It's just a slow process but it's moving as it seems as I expected it to happen. Justice is slow but it is apparent. I am glad it's still there.
The one that really worried me was the new problem that was connected with the burglary. Later that month, I just found out that three of my credit cards, two of which I was not using anymore, were stolen from my safe and were used up because of the bills that had arrived that month indicating that all three cards were been maxed up. I panicked initially because apart from the big problem caused by the burglary another enormous problem had cropped up. I have to call all the three credit card companies to explain my side and asked them courteously to forgive the exorbitant amounts that were charged which I did not actually do. Good thing they did forgive me after I submitted some necessary paperworks to dissolve the charges. I was thankful and relieved.
February ushered in gradually in anticipation of my second trip to Mexico on Valentines Day to see and met my close and dear boyfriend who toured me extensively to some key places like Queretaro, Guanajuato, Tlaxco, Tlaxcala, and San Miguel de Allende besides from Mexico City, Puebla, Coyoacan, Xochimilco, and Teotihuacan which I visited before. That was an unforgettable Valentines Day I've had.
The shocker for this month was the sudden death of Whitney Houston at the Beverly Hills Hotel the afternoon before the Golden Globe Awards was been transpired. She's supposed to present an award during that event but she was rushed to the hospital due to an undisclosed diagnosis but later was found out to be drug related. Rest in peace Whitney. Your legacy in music will be remembered forever.
March slowly crawled in and it held a lot of good literal promises. I had my first tympanoplasty of my right ear on March 5 and it totally changed my life in full turn. Previously I have a lot of trouble hearing sounds and right now I can hear better. I thought I will end up permanently deaf but my ear doctor had gave me realistic hopes and that sole hope he had promised me had changed my life big time. It was a relief that the surgery had helped greatly on my part which I benefitted hugely and I am so thankful for God to be there all the time for me, comforting me during those moments of my fears and apprehensions.
April was the slowest month but it seems that the flowers had bloomed well because I started to put perennial plants and flowers in the patio and had carefully planted some herbs also for my cooking sessions sometimes. I moved upstairs after it was vacated by the tenant who actually burglarized my apartment downstairs last year. I like the place because of the wooden floors and the big windows that had ventilated the entire room as well as the big patio that can accommodate my wide array of potted plants and wherein I can do and improve my gardening hobby.
May was a lot enjoyable because of the American Idol contest. I religiously followed the show because of Jessica Sanchez, a young Filipino-American from Chula Vista, California who clinched to the finals with great determination. Each week I tried voting for her and Filipinos all over the world were pinning their eyes on TV every Tuesdays and Wednesdays to just watch her sing beautifully and vote for her as well. She sings magnificently and was a very promising little girl. All of my friends were rooting for her and kept voting for her to win. She won as a runner-up but to our hearts she is the clear winner. Her duet with Jennifer Holliday, of the Dreamgirls, was the most talked and watched in YouTube. It even went viral compared to the winner's videos. My dad's birthday was also been remembered during this month.
June was another enjoyable month. My rotation at Totally Kids had started well and the students had liked it there very much. They say they've learned a lot from the facility especially learning extensively about Pediatrics, which is my specialty. I also remembered my mom's birthday during this month. It was during this month also that Manny Pacquiao had loss to Timothy Bradley at MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada via a split judges' decision although Manny has many points ahead of Bradley but the judges awarded the latter the championship belt.This was the first loss of Manny Pacquiao despite years of being an excellent professional boxer and winning a lot of difficult boxing bouts in different weight categories.
July was the month where I remembered my mom's passing. I was at her deathbed on that hapless and sad rainy day of July 10, 2009. Mom was ready to leave us that time and I know she did her best for us. I love you mom. Sadly, our family had lost another patriarch from lung cancer during this month. Rest in peace Tito Nonoy (he's my mom's first cousin). We will remember you as a good father to your family. It was on this month also that I started cooking and posting my finished products online. My cooking prowess was been very good actually and I am proud I get to do it alone with finesse.
August was when Summer actually started and herald the start of the 31st Summer Olympics in London. I religiously followed the events and I've watched all of it because I recorded them everyday on my DVR. I especially watched the exciting Track and Field as well as the breath taking Gymnastics. My fave swimmer from Japan had lost but I am still proud of his legacy in the breast stroke winning two previous olympics in Greece and Beijing in the 100m and 200m breast stroke respectively but he already matured and his energy and stamina had already waned.
There were good stories about some famous and not-so-famous athletes that I highlighted on this month in my blogs and I am very touched about their unexpected victory and their poignant journey to the olympics winning the eluded and most coveted gold medal for themselves and their country.
It was on this month also that I had my second tympanoplasty surgery on my left ear done on August 21st and again it was a grand success. Now that both ears were fixed I can hear better and my hearing was been amplified a hundred fold. Now, I can even do swimming as prescribed by my doctor and will have no worries about wetting the middle ear and most especially worry about the dreaded ear infection. I was so happy about it that I hugged my ear doctor appreciatively and thanked him for his compassion and great help. No words I can describe my gratefulness to him and I always prayed a lot for him in my everyday prayers.
It was on this month also that we started the phone attendance with a GPS for our clinical rotation for my teaching job as a clinical instructor. At first there were a lot of repercussions, retaliations, and negative comments about it from the students but eventually they had adapted to it. It worked actually for me, I don't know about them.
September was a chaotic month. In every thing I do there's always trouble and hardships and it was on this month that a lot of problems, adversities, and trials had came out. This just appeared all of a sudden which I couldn't even control. My financial savings were been on the low at this month because of the conflict in school wherein my scheduler did not gave me a lot of assignments to handle and that I have no enough dollar to set aside for my monthly savings. It was on this month that I was reflecting enormously, deeply asking myself if I still wanted to continue teaching so I prayed a lot for God's answer and response to my personal qualms.
My God didn't fail me because He knows that I loved teaching and He's the one that really provides for me every day. Eventhough I have a lot of problems at this month I still survived all the trials and tribulations and still came out victorious in the end. The scheduler was been kicked out from school and my schedule was been back to normal again and overtime was always not a problem. I gradually regained my financial flow thereby I was able to come back to a normal life again. Whew that was close!
Because of the hot weather, it was on this month that I started to run outdoors and enjoy the scorching heat of the sun on my auburn skin. I tried to lose weight and I regularly went to the gym almost every day doing hard and gruelling cardiovascular exercises on the treadmill, stairs, and bike. I lost an ample amount of weight and I regained my stamina and endurance as well.
October was the busiest month for me. I requested a two weeks off during this month in anticipation of my visitor from the Philippines. When my visitor came we started a road trip going to Northern California using the famous California coastal roads along Highway 1. From Los Angeles to Pescadero, it was a very thrilling and unforgettable ride and we enjoyed a lot of beautiful places and spectacular sceneries along the way plotting and chasing every lighthouses we saw along the way. That was the grandest ride I've ever had in my entire life and I may be doing it again in the near future.
October was my birthday month also and this year marks my 43rd year of borrowed existence. From the tasteful pizza party in Italy last year I decided to regress this time. Me and my friends planned to go and celebrate it at Disneyland and Disney's California Adventure to just simply act silly and be a clueless child again. The trip to the happiest place on earth eventually had given me the best birthday celebration ever. Meeting Mickey and Minnie and their friends had topped it all! It was the happiest birthday I've ever had together with my closest friends.
At the end of October one young Filipino missionary was been elevated into sainthood on October 20th in Rome. So I'd like to commemorate this month as a celebration of blessed Saint Pedro Calungsod's recognition and confirmation as a Christian saint in Vatican City, Rome, Italy. He was an epitome of a piteous and celebate life and his life ended haplessly in the hands of the angry natives of Guam whom he wanted to indoctrinate. Yet the Christian world had remembered what he did to disseminate Christianity thereby Pope Benedict XVI and the millions of faithful Christians had elevated him to sainthood on that glorious day of October 20th along with other saints from other parts of the world anointed that day.
November started the rainy days but the rain just won't stop me doing mission visits. I got this promise to do visits of all the mission churches here in California because I dedicated it for my aunt who suffered from a renascent cancer, invoking his blessed Junipero Serra (the Italian Franciscan missionary who founded the California missions in the 1700s) to do his blessed miracle to my dear aunt.
It was also on this month that I accidentally discovered a Danish settlement north of Santa Barbara on my way to one of the mission church there in Santa Ynez valley. Solvang was a beautiful and captivating place and I took notice and had liked the colorful and huge windmills that were abundant there, reminiscent of a country called Denmark, where the people living there initially came.
November 23rd marked the 100th blog of my official blogsite for this year and I am proud of myself for keeping to blog and record all my feelings and contemplations in life hence the name of the blogsite "Inner Contemplations". I've been blogging every now and then for four years and I am extremely proud that I am still on fire doing it. Writing is my favorite past time and I won't abate myself doing it as long as I am breathing.
November also was the month of the Presidential Elections and I am sad that my favorite candidate, Mitt Romney, did not win. I am not affiliated with any political party and agenda but my ideologies and principles of not voting for Obama was due partly to a very personal reason that I was inadvertently taxed enormously this year. It was really unfair for me and to others because I have worked my ass off to earn money but only taxed exorbitantly for those lazy people who is dependent on the government's welfare. I have a lot of complaints about them because you can see them driving around with nice cars and buying premium foods at the grocery stores as well as living in a plush living communities yet they have the right to dupe the government as well as demand for my tax to spend for them. The society has been gone awry nowadays.
December started to get cold and full of shocking news as well. The sad news about Typhon Pablo who hit the Philippines lately which had killed a hundreds of Filipino people in the south of the country especially in South-Eastern Mindanao had shocked the world. It was very devastating to all the Filipinos and more devastation had came to the country. Added to that the loss of Manny Pacquiao to Juan Manuel Marquez on their fourth rematch via a technical knockout on the third round at MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada was even more shocking to the Filipino community.
Another shocker was the sad news about the sudden demise of my beloved Tita Inday whom I was praying and doing the mission churches visit invoking the blessed Junipero Serra for a miracle was even unimaginable. It's God's will to have her leave us and I am glad she was at peace now. That I have to accept with all my heart because it was His will.
Another shocker that had greatly shocked the Filipino community this year was the first runner-up victory of Ms. Janine Mari Togonon, a Filipino representative in the just currently concluded annual Miss Universe contest held at Planet Hollywood in Las Vegas, Nevada. She was expected to win the title after wittingly answering her Q&A portion but sadly she only bagged the first runner-up position and the title was won by Miss USA represented by Ms. Olivia Culpo of Rhode Island. The Filipino community was really proud of her. Kudos to you Ms. Janine Mari Togonon!
Although the year has not ended officially yet there's still a lot of celebrations coming. One celebration I am really expecting was our 25th Reunion (Silver Anniversary) for our High School class which will be held in our high school grounds on December 29 and 30. Sadly, I could not attend the said occasion because of some schedule conflict at work. I already explained it to my classmates and they understood. I know that the programs were already been perfectly planned-out and the events were been carefully and meticulously prepared and I am very confident that this will be a great success.
I am thankful that my classmates were cooperating fully, participating with full dedication, and were excited about it. Me too was also excited for it to happen. I am just waiting for some good news about it and myriad pictures to be posted in Facebook for the rest of us who could not make it there. Anyway, we will be getting in touch through Skype during that day so it all came out I am also celebrating it with my classmates. See what technology can do to get us more closer?
Well, these were the fleeting highlights of the year 2012 that I can vividly remember and I am extremely happy and thankful that 2012 was quite a very promising and progressive year for me despite of some minor setbacks but I held through with it and still continued to thrive with it. Although the Mayan prophecy that the world will end on December 21, 2012 was not successfully been transpired it seems that it had conveyed a bold and fierce message that life here on earth will still continue and that no prophecy can even stop it to dynamically evolve.
Before 2012 officially ends with a grand exit, I hope everything will be in order and taken cared of and that some but not all of this past events will be buried in the trinket of oblivion especially those that are needed to be forgotten. Hopefully 2013 will be ushering in gradually, and I hope that it will bring me more good tidings, fulfilling progress, and an auspicious year all through out. That will remain to be seen yet and I can't wait to see, feel, and hear it myself.
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