WHAT LIGHT MEANS TO THE MOTH

And I knew it wasn't really easy.

The lights were out when I got home at 10 tonight. I just took a quick candlelight dinner with myself and went straight to my room to prepare for the last and worst one and a half hours of my day. Or should I say night. Using my phone's backlight as the only source of illumination, I've already written down a few sentences on my scratch paper, when my pupils suddenly stopped dilating. Brownout's over.

There's this one documentary from years back that never left my mind and which always reminded me how lucky I was as a kid, especially back in my high school days. "Gamu-gamo Sa Dilim" was the title of this I-Witness classic by Kara David, a documentary about young school children who travel for miles walking past mountains to get to their makeshift schoolhouse, and by the time they get home late at night to study, not even a single lamppost can help them see what they were reading or writing. But their determination to learn and reach for their dreams through this education served as the only light in finishing their race to life.

I had my laptop fully charged minutes ago but I decided to take that darkness-filled moment as an opportunity to experience perhaps what I may not voluntarily do had I had the choice. It wasn't really easy. And it just reminded me once more how grateful I should be for everything I have now, both bad and good. 

It's natural for us to always feel the least blessed when something bad happens. That, despite the fact that out of the 365 days of the year, I bet not even 30 days of it will be spent with such unfortunate events. And because we concentrate more on the negatives, we crumble altogether, feeling miserable, ruining the remaining 335 days of sunshine.

For ten years now that scene of the children in "Gamu-gamo" has been my leverage in reminding myself that things are not always there as default, like the simple lights that we take for granted. But I would not want to stop there, because besides being grateful for such, that light is supposed to be shared. And I sure am looking forward to it pretty soon. #

photo credit: matangapoy