ISKRIBOL (Mga Suka ng Isang Bored na Otistik)

Suka #12

MADMAN ALMOST FICTION | How I Met the Mist (and other tales from a nirvana two rungs down from heaven)

She's a fog, actually. But let me romanticize that speck of spectacle and call her "the mist". Technically she is the mist. And I prefer her for a woman. Whatever.

I was hitting the road with a friend, and her father, when that moment flashed and I wished I could've frozen it. She was like a lady up in the mountains embracing, or protecting, that allure that is nature. Her transcendent aura brought me to a trance like a child about to receive his first Voltes V limited collection set for free. It was a moment meant for absorption, and absorption alone.

In that exact moment I craved to be near. You know, do all ignorant stuff an ignorant urban boy does when he suddenly decides to spend two days in the province while it storms like hell. And by ignorant stuff I mean put the fog in a plastic can and bring it home, put it in an explosion-proof glass and stare at it like it's Emma Watson-clothes off. Nature orgasm, yes.

I got close to her after battling with mountains standing so proud and cocky and too overwhelmed of themselves that they can't be conquered. Screw you, mountains. I just stepped on you. Let's go back to that getting close stuff. But, really, this holocaust-like body right here just conquered the highest peak in Cebu.

So I was embracing her like a prisoner who just broke out of his cage. I let her invade me-and I loved that invasion. She touched my very existence and I was overwhelmed. You see, when you're in that moment of witnessing the majesty of the mist, you just want to disappear and be part of her beauty.

Heaven, you're only two rungs up there

Here is a nirvana standing supremely high southeast of Cebu. It's a painting made of mountain strokes, misty palettes, and canton colors of its people who greet you "Good morning" despite you being a stranger. It really felt nice doing that part, greeting random people. Everybody really needs to inflict happiness.

Dalaguete is the closest utopia. Scrap your A/C units for it's freaking cold up there everyday, especially mornings. Though it demands you climbing mountains, trekking long roads, riding a motorcycle they fondly call as "habal-habal", the place was worth all physical injuries.

It was more like of an alternate universe. Up there, you just have to look up and you will realize you could knock on heaven's door. But the best thing is that it is already a paradise itself. The grounded humility of its people will really make you feel guilty about your material whines. School kids crusading for hours, kilometers far from education will shut the hell out of you. Your rants about traffic while inside an air-conditioned van are too shy for comparison.

And vegetables are everywhere. Nutrition isn't in the form of tablets and syrups. They don't have nasty black water we normally see in our street sides. It's a reflection of LotR's The Shire. Nevermind the not-so-tall hobbits, though.

Yes, mom, I'm up here flirting with nature

It is in these kinds of escapes that I feel rebellious, free, and transformed. My pale, uneventful life in the city was creatively being painted with superb strokes as I was flirting with nature. I didn't want to go home and be slapped by complexities. These convolutions suck me up everyday. I had enough of these slaps. I want to be caressed like a child tired of running for the whole day-lying down in her arms in a dreamy fascination that life is all better when I wake up. But it was a temporary ticket. Nevertheless, it was a ticket I'll definitely buy again.

I met the mist, and I met myself. She is the mist. I am the mist. In that nirvana that showed me life with beautiful complications, I cleared the mist within me. What I see now is a peculiar boy with glasses hungry for more adventure, habal-habal rides, mountain slips and slides, and all nature romances.