Have you ever woken up and felt like you were the ugliest person in the world?  Just looked in the mirror and wished you were someone else.  Sat down and started thinking of all the horrible thoughts and ideas that you've had.  Have you ever just decided that you couldn't be you anymore?

I'm not what I want to be, or what I'm going to be, but thank God I'm not what I was.

Suppose I died tonight and appear before God, and God asks, "By what right should allow you into my presence?"  How would I answer?  I would not have much to answer with.  I haven't really done anything, and what I have done, are trivial at best.  I could say, "I believe in you," and that, according to some is enough.  I, however, have always pushed for more.  Maybe I'm overly critical of myself.

There will always be doubts and maybe the question should be "Why shouldn't allow you into my presence?"  I could probably answer that much easier.  Thoughts rush back into my mind about whether I did all that I could for my mom.  Did I administer enough morphine?  Did I administer too much?  Did I leave too much?  Should I have dropped out of school?  Much of it is a blur, yet so much of it is crystal clear.

In the meantime, I have many causes to work on and work towards.  One is the veteran's issue.  Am I doing all that I can?  Should I sacrifice more?  SAVE has a new website in its preliminary stages up.  http://www.fullequitynow.com.  There's just so much I want to do and so much to be done.  Maybe that's why I haven't died yet.  I have much more to give.

May I just say that Parliamentary Procedure will not make the most asenine point more relevant or valid.  I attended a meeting yesterday, for the hopefully one-day built Filipino Community Center.  This was my first meeting, and the only reason I stayed for the whole thing is because the community center is very important.  Otherwise, I would've cut out so fast. 

The meeting started by the president addressing some sort of letter that was sent to him via United States Postal Service Registered Mail, and cc'd to the rest of the Board of Directors.  The letter was in effect complaining about how the organization was "relegating" its supreme power over the Filipino Fiesta.

I was thinking, "I'm living this whole Mga Kapatid as a blanket organization argument again."  It was the same sort of argument back then at UC Davis.  Which, by the way, never was really solved.  People just kind of forgot about it and went about their own business.

So, people wanted to harp on about the power the organization "should" have over the Fiesta, and to make matters worse, the president was, in my opinion, was not open to opinions dissenting from his own.  Everyone that talked was standing up, saying stuff like "Mr. President..." at the beginning of each sentence.  Not to mention that the tension was high.  In any case, the final word was that the coalition had already been created, and it was up to the board to decide if they wanted to be part of the coalition or not.  It was too late to change.

On to the primary scheduled issue of the community center.  It's a $1.3M project.  The organization has owned the land since the 1970's I believe.  They've been trying to raise funds for four years now.  Let's just say they have less than 10% of the whole thing, if they liquidated their whole bank account, which would pretty much destroy the organization.  Sounds daunting.  I don't think they have been working to their utmost potential.  We'll see if I can't help get it more efficient.  Maybe I could get it named after me.  Or a room or something.  Sounds like a plan.

No great epiphanies within the last twenty-four hours.  My Tagalog 402 class is quite challenging thus far.  I'm always having to look into my dictionary.  It's a push that I've been needing though.  After class, I was talking to a friend, and she was talking about her guy criteria.  In other words, certain criteria that a guy has to have in order for her to date him.  I think it's a bunch of shallow bullshit, but that's just my opinion.  For example, she says he can't be under 23 or "going on 37."  :"He can be 36, but he can't be going on 37," she said.  What in Zeus' butthole is that?  If someone's 36, aren't they going on 37?  If I'm 24, aren't I going on 37 too?  Anyways, we started tossing around the word love, and how it doesn't carry the same meaning as it used to, as well as marriage.  In Tagalog, there are three words for love: gusto, mahal, and ibig.  Ibig is that deep, passionate love.  Mahal is love like the way most Americans think of it.  Gusto is like "I love to play basketball" kind of love.  At least that's how we learned it in class.  My conclusion was this.  True love does exist, and there isn't only one person that you can share true love with.  Now I don't mean I believe in polygamous relationships.  I just mean that with 6 billion people on the planet, there is more than one person that you would be compatible enough with to get married to.  That's not a requirement to get married either.  It just means that we have potential soul mates out there. 

Well, it's over.  I didn't get to say the goodbye's that I wanted to.  Maybe it means I'll run into most of the cast still.  I hope so.  I don't think that I could've worked with a better cast or in a better play for what I consider my first "real" play.  "I shall remember them."  I told myself that I wouldn't quote everyone from the cast when I am engaged in normal conversation.  That didn't happen.  I do it all the time.  I also thought that opening night would be the biggest turn-out.  It was quite the opposite.  The end of the run was definitely more attended than the beginning.

I didn't mention that Jeannie Barroga, the playwright came to watch the show for a third time on Saturday night.  That was a treat.  I spoke with her and thanked her again.  Also a couple of people from El Teatro Campesino came to watch that night.  If you don't know, El Teatro Campesino was a theater company that was founded amidst the farm workers' movement to help spread the message of the people. 

I really grew from the play.  I learned more about the Vietnam War, learned more about a heroine that deserves a lot more credit than she gets in Ms. Maya Lin, encountered many different perspectives on that war and the one now, and I met some really great and talented people.

I also realize how big of a risk Ms. Angela-Dee Alforque, our director, took by having me, a novice in the arts, in the show.  I think I came through for her.  I hope I did.  Her directorial debut and she had a lot riding on it.

Most of it hasn't hit me just yet.  It will.  It's only a matter of time.  I hope everyone could have a great experience like this that makes them feel the way I do right now.  Luxurious.