I'm here, in front of this heap of silicon and plastic called a PC, typing this LiveJournal entry. There's a bowl of half-eaten potato salad next to me, on the desk. We moved the PC to the living room, where a home office has been set up. The CPU's power supply fan is making that same irritating whir. Outside, the magtataho has just passed by.
It's a sunny day. It's bright, cheery, sunny. Yesterday, it was raining.
It's Christmas Eve, I tell myself.
It doesn't feel like it. Amid even the materialism, the TV ads, the Christmas carols... it still doesn't feel like it.
Maybe, just maybe, it'll hit me tonight as I wait for the clock to strike twelve. Maybe, just maybe, I'll tell myself that I feel the Christmas spirit.
Yesterday, we celebrated an early Christmas.
Our usual Christmas celebration involved going to my maternal aunt's house in Paranaque. There, we would celebrate our Noche Buena, with all of my maternal relatives. At midnight, the eldest cousin would go to the tree and start distributing the gifts that lay underneath, calling out the names on the cards and handing them around.
Then, the day after Christmas we would all hie up to Baguio, and then come back down to celebrate New Year, also at the same aunt's house.
This year, we celebrated Christmas Eve a day early.
This year, I looked around my relatives faces, and I didn't find Christmas.
Previously: No Subject