I’m so done with customizing…not! I changed again my theme to Illustratr. And guess what, it’s the 234th day of the year!

Down The Rabbit Hole — A Dreamy Trip To Scotland

It was a Buzzfeed post that got me hooked on Isle Of Skye, an island in Scotland. Upon seeing the beauty it has, I researched about Scotland itself. And boy, it is on top of my wanderlust bucket list!

Quiraing Mountain Pass (PHOTO C/O BUZZFEED)

Scotland has a lot to offer. The only thing that made me want to visit Scotland so bad is its natural formations — overlooking mountains and breathtaking landscapes. It’s very peaceful and calm, and the rock formations are just to die for. Want to feel like a princess someday? Scotland also has castles! I don’t have an idea on what’s inside or what they are for, but I’ve seen photos of such castles with the greens surrounding them and they’re simply amazing.

Princes Street Edinburgh at night (PHOTO C/O FREE IMAGES LIVE © Photoeverywhere)

Scotland’s architecture is great — bridges, buildings, housing, castles — and you bet that outside those historic views is a rich culture and an adaptive lifestyle. I really hope that when I get to work, I can save up and travel to Scotland.

FEATURED IMAGE C/O TELEGRAPH.CO.UK © Emmanuel Coupe

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Silhouette — A Take From The Province

It was the summer of 2014 where I truly enjoyed staying at our province. It’s safe to say that it really is my second home, since we really have a house there now. I really love Mindoro because of the fresh, clean air and you can see rice fields everywhere you go! Trees of all sorts dominate the place, especially coconut trees.

It was at twilight where I decided to take a picture of the coconut trees against the resting sun. The silhouette of the trees is simply breath-taking.

Another silhouette that I accidentally took was me. That’s how bright the sunlight is from a province. It vibrates so much that when I decided to take a photo of me with my view at the background, I turned almost black because I was so against the light! But at least you can still see me smile. :-)

My Own Sylvia Plath

“What horrifies me most is the idea of being useless: well-educated, brilliantly promising, and fading out into an indifferent middle age.” ― Sylvia Plath, The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath (2000)

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I never met Sylvia Plath. I never saw how she looked like, except in some photo results in Google which is fairly disturbing for a black-and-white photograph in which she is sitting in front of a bookshelf. I never read her works, except that poem which I needed in one of my subjects for school. I have basically no idea or whatsoever about Sylvia Plath. I first knew about her when a friend of mine tweeted something that she wrote, basically my friend quoted her. I was curious. I fired up Google and studied her. I adore Sylvia Plath. I became obsessed with her in a way that I want to travel back in the 50s and be in that generation. I want to be one of those teenagers who are in her verge of exploring arts, music, and literature and let Sylvia one of her poem goddess.

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Sylvia’s parents were successful. Her mother Aurelia was an educator; her father Otto was an entomologist and a professor of biology and German. Despite the image of her parents, Sylvia’s relationship with her mother lies on a rocky road: they were exceptionally close with each other, and on the other hand Sylvia hated her mother.

Depression became Sylvia’s life partner when she was just 8 years old, around the time of her father’s death. A loss in faith and uncertainty in religion resulted to that. But she then channeled her feelings on poetry. Sylvia is an introvert, a vulnerable one for that matter. I guess she is the epitome of introverts. But at the same time she was a typical teenager. She had boyfriends in her college years. And around that time she opened herself to the idea of suicide. I must say, Sylvia was brave and transparent at the same time. I’m not at all praising her suicide attempts, but I’m simply amazed to her guts and thinking. The first one was more of a thought — the time when she’s supposed to meet Dylan Thomas, the poet whom she loved “more than life itself”. About three years after, she had her first suicide attempt wherein she took some of her mother’s pills. “Blissfully succumbed to the whirling blackness that I honestly believed was eternal oblivion”, she later wrote. After some non-consecutive years of treatments, her hard work paid off. She graduated with highest honors in college.

Like any other dreamy woman, Sylvia fell in love with poet Ted Hughes as she read his works. Later on they get married and moved to the United States. She then met Robert Lowell and Anne Sexton, whom of which she opened her depression state and suicide attempts. Sharing her feelings with others led her to become a serious and focused writer. I’m impressed with Sylvia because she finally let her closed world open and not revolve around her anymore. I guess that’s what depression does to you.

Not long after, they moved back to the United Kingdom where they actually started a family. Most of what happened in Plath’s life reflects on her poems, one of which was her second pregnancy which resulted in miscarriage. As much as she wanted to be open and free off herself, she remained anxious about writing personal and private material. Based on some stated subjects, I can say that she has deep emotions in her poems. Her depression grew, resulting in a car accident which described as one of her suicide attempts. They moved locations, and one resulted into the couple’s separation after Plath having 2 children. Ted Hughes had an affair with Assia Wevill. Another depression factor was when she lived alone with her children during one of the coldest winters in UK.

Sylvia Plath is famous because of her poems and her only novel The Bell Jar. What’s striking is that she is also known for how she died: her head was in the oven with the gas turned on. Days before her death, Dr. John Horder, a friend of hers, gave her antidepressants that sadly take about weeks to take effect. Knowing that she lives alone with her children, he made an effort to help Plath by having her admitted in a hospital, and later on arranged a live-in nurse. It was the morning of 11 February 1963 when the nurse should help Plath in taking care of her children, but rather had a turn of events. Some believed that she didn’t intently kill herself; her best friend took one of the policeman’s words and believed otherwise.

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I believe that inside the depressed, inferior Sylvia Plath is a wonderful and powerful woman. She was clearly selfish when she had those suicide attempts — leaving her daughter and son without a mother figure. But after those moments her mind awakened a bit. She did die, but she cared for her children. She didn’t drag them down her empty world. She placed wet towels and cloths in the gaps of the door of the kitchen to the children’s room. She loved her children. She also loved Ted, but Ted just turned out to be a total douche. I am in no way supportive of Plath’s suicide ideas. But I understood her depression state, for which I had back then and about recently. Depression is sad, and she handled it in contradicting ways. She gave in her emotions into words that demanded to be felt. Her literary works turned out to be a success of hers. But ironically, she continuously hurt herself, giving up every time she felt she had no one around her anymore. A cry for help indeed, her death will always be remembered. An undying mystery of introversion in the literary field, Sylvia Plath will always be in my heart.

“I felt dull and flat and full of shattered visions.” ― Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar (1963)

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Disclaimer: This was originally written as a requirement in my Psychology class. All judgments were based on Sylvia Plath’s Wikipedia page. Everything written were interpretations of how I understood her profile. Don’t hate.

Will Finally Read…

OFF THE SHELF: “Take a look at your bookcase. If you had enough free time, which book would be the first one you’d like to reread? Why?”

I am a self-proclaimed bookworm. Two books in my collection are unread. Two books were opened, but haven’t gotten to the end yet. The rest, well, I’ve read but haven’t reread yet. I love books, believe me. I’m not just in that moment where I want books to take over my life. Not seen in the picture though is Cecelia Ahern’s Where Rainbows End (the one which is adapted into a film titled Love, Rosie). It’s my favorite since it’s written in an epistolary form — letters, e-mail, conversations. And the story is simple yet shows a form of undying love of two people. I lent it to a friend so that she’ll have an idea on what I’m talking about. It’s a great story, but it’s not something that I’ll reread.

No, I didn’t staged a messy desk. My desk is really THAT messy.

I’m gonna break a rule here. I know it says ‘reread’ but I still choose The Da Vinci Code. I haven’t read the book yet, though I watched the movie (and I know it sucks to compare a book to a movie). I cleaned my desk yesterday (and look how messy it is again) and I just felt that I should pick up this book. I don’t know why, but something felt like it needed to be read. I know it’s a great story since it’s…well, to be honest I forgot how the movie went but I’m pretty sure that the story has something to do with Rome and old paintings and stuff. That’s why I want to read this book. I want to grasp the secrets behind the historical arts (or something. please help me out here) through Dan Brown’s words. And if I ever finished reading this, I know that I’ll reread it. Nothing beats the feeling of mystery in a book.