I once went on a date with Arvin Jimenez. That probably doesn’t register as significant, so let me rephrase that. I once went on a date with Tado.

At the time, which was almost a decade ago, he was known as that funny guy on Strangebrew, with a band called Big Time Tado (Big TT for short).

The thing is, I was a last-minute substitute for a contest winner who had better things to do than claim her prize, which was a date with Tado.

We ate at a restaurant which was not exactly fancy, but also not somewhere you'd go without your parents, unless you're employed.

We had vegetarian pizza, and Tado prodded at his black olives with a fork, asking me why there was barbula on the pizza.

(I remember that night fondly because it increased my vocabulary by one word – barbula, as it was explained to me, is the rubber fitting used in faucets.)

Later in the evening, the “date” was aired over the radio, and Tado, asked by the DJ if I was pretty, said “Hmm... maputi siya.”
This happened maybe eight years ago, and though I had told the story a number of times to get a few laughs from people, I had pretty much forgotten about it until this week.

You know how some people say "maputi lang" when asked if someone is only good-looking?

I'd wondered about that before. If to be fair-skinned is a "lang," then what's with all the whitening products?

Researching about the dangers of skin whitening, I came across several online debates about wanting fairer skin.

The best cases both for and against, in my opinion, were, in simple terms, "don't mess with nature" and “don't judge other people for what they think is beautiful.”

Also, isn't wanting to be beautiful natural, too?

I once said I didn't understand what the obsession was with whitening, at a time when soap with one whitening ingredient or another was the rule and not the exception.

Buying soap was surprisingly difficult, because almost everything featured vitamins, minerals, and always, always Plus! New! Whitening Formula!

(My favorite is sandalwood soap, less than thirty pesos, doesn't disappear quickly, lathers well, but yes my fascination with soap is beside the point.)

It was frustrating for me, because I didn't want any whitening ingredients in my soap.

Not because I didn't want to become whiter, worse things could happen, but I didn't like the idea of putting chemicals on my skin. (As an anticipatory measure for what a number of people (Hi, Pa!) are likely to say re: chemicals, I think I should qualify this doesn't translate to an aversion to chemicals inside the body.)

Before I get lost in a maze of parentheses and other topics, "It's easy for you to say, you're already fair," was what someone told me.

Which got me thinking, would I mind if I were darker? The answer is yes, but only because it wouldn't be as easy to spot dirt on my skin. (OCD will be discussed in a future entry.)

My sister, when she was born, had skin so much like porcelain you could see the bluish green veins.

She was also sickly and had a large head so that one day she leaned over her crib and promptly toppled over. She turned out better than alright, being our overachiever. End of digression.

My mama said she felt like people who'd see her carrying my sister must think she was a nanny.

Mama is dark-skinned. The point there, though, was not that she wanted to be fairer-skinned. Just that my sister didn't take after her.

Last summer, we went to Sariaya, Quezon for a few days.

Courting disaster, I walked along the shoreline every day we were there, without sunblock, As a result, I came home with sand in my pockets and a tanline to beat all tanlines. I had burn lines.

My skin was literally black. I never quite recovered since, but I'm happily brown.

There was a time I was happily orange from eating too many carrots, but that's a different story.

Before this research, I didn't know much about the stuff they put in whitening products, except that it's best to stick with the simpler cleaning agents.

My lola had always told me that soap and water is all you need, and I believed her.

Now that I know what they really put in there, I'm really glad we weren't brought up using this and that lotion or cream.

A lot of formulas have a cocktail of chemicals in them, and some, like hydroquinone, can have pretty painful side-effects. It's like cigarettes. (May or may not be discussed in the future.)

While I'm tempted to say don't mess with what you have, we all have our own preferences.

A comment on this article predicts that soon, people will be dyeing their skin different colors.

I guess that's sort of what tattoos are.

Maybe the point is simply wanting to do things to your body, experimenting, seeing what floats your boat.

Although that probably applies more to hair styles and tattoos and body piercing than wanting your skin to be a different color.

(Insert endless debate on racial and cultural issues)

I'm inclined to just let people alone.

I'd say let them do what they want, as long as they're well-informed.

As the Wiccan Rede goes, an' it harm none, do what ye will.

It isn’t one of my strengths.

Gifted with an uncannily vivid memory, I can still remember as far back as when I was two years old. I know this, because I can remember the apartment my family used to live in, and this was before I went to kindergarten.

Kindergarten for me was not where I learned everything I needed to know. It was, however, where I first experienced a number of things which turned out to be recurring themes in my life.

Case in point: Our school had an excellent playground, not in terms of safety but in terms of fun and adventure potential. Of course, when you’re a pre-schooler, pretty much everything has adventure potential.

The playground had a slide, a swing set, and everyone’s favorite way to get an adrenalin rush (and cuts and bruises in the bargain) – the merry-go-round.

I was not, however, what could be classified as the typical pre-schooler. My most memorable moment at that playground was swinging by myself looking at the trees and wondering about the existence of God.

The paragraphs above are proof of 1) my penchant for digressions and 2) my weakness when it comes to letting go.

I admit that the latter is not very clearly demonstrated by the preceding paragraphs, so I will do my best to elaborate, in the shortest possible sentence.

My mind goes a million directions at once and sifting through my thoughts is too difficult, so I end up mentioning everything instead of just sticking to the topic at hand.

I realize this makes me rather unfit for journalism, but that’s another story – perhaps one I will never tell, lest it become grounds for losing my job.

Letting go is not that simple.

To let go, to relax, to choose what to keep and what to throw (here you may notice this is actually a New Year’s post), this is easier said than done. Anyone who’s tried cleaning out their cabinet or desk or, if you’re ambitious, bodega, knows how taxing a process this is.

Packrats that we are at home, we have accumulated enough white elephants to fill a savannah.

I’m not kidding.

Ondoy, horrible calamity as it was, did us a favor by soaking our ten or so years’ worth of papers beyond recognition, thus solving our incorrigible indecision when it came to the question, to throw or not to throw.

Those papers had been in boxes for ages, waiting to be sorted through.

People who had the misfortune of visiting our house used to comment, “Hey, your house isn’t so messy for someone who just moved in.”

We had been living there for more than two decades.

Even after Ondoy, we still had an unbelievably large pile of maybe-junk to sort through.

You sit for hours, looking through the mountains of reminders of how you once were – your grades – your test papers which were filled with more doodles than answers – your embarrassing declarations of undying devotion to people whose names you can no longer put a face to.

If you’re lucky, you may even find resolutions from New Years past – the ones you make again and again.

If you’re sentimental, like many Pinoys are, you probably keep things like receipts and straws.

I try to tell myself, these things are not the memories, but every time I sit down and face my collection, I feel a pang whenever I put something in the throw pile.
Hardly practical, I know.

So I tell myself firmly…

Toss them out. Not on the street, of course, but you know what I mean. Actually, you may as well sell all your old paper.

Unless you have plenty of time on your hands, then you can recycle your paper yourself, and end up with a year’s worth of green gifts for every birthday, anniversary, and graduation.

The point of this (yes, there is one), is that letting go is a good way to lessen your baggage.

It seems like I’m stating the obvious, but I don’t just mean literal weight.

It’s a sort of purging, a catharsis, even, to be able to let things go. Not necessarily to forget, but to be able to say, “I’ve filed you in the past, so don’t come haunting me.”

Now, if we’re talking about history, that’s different. Don’t let go. In fact, hang on for dear life.

History repeats itself because people forget the mistakes they already made.

But before I venture into serious (political) waters, I will step back onto relatively safe (personal) shores.

The last decade was the worst ever, said Time. I’m not so sure it was the worst, but I think, and a lot of people will probably concur it was pretty bad, judging from this and the fact that status messages bidding 2009 goodbye have been flooding my Facebook wall.

So, my only resolution is to move on into the next decade bringing as little as possible from the last one. After all, it’s always been a good idea to travel light.