A Small Forever

It's 5:45AM, the 5th of December. Daybreak. I cradle my mug and feel the warmth of my hot chocolate while gazing out from my bedroom window. The smell of freshly baked bread fills the whole pad as the soft rumblings of the city awaken. A whiff of early morning breeze of Cristmastime tickles my nose.

I smile to myself. This is my reverie. A sweet escape. It is one simple minute that is unmistakably mine for the taking. It is no less than pure joy, sheer luck and utter blessing. It is but another day, another chance, another leaf of my lifetime.

How many moments have trickled down my years? Those that would always be remembered, the ones I used to want to forget yet are much deeply carved in my memory, some that I may have forgotten but may still somehow be a part of my random musings, and the most that have simply passed me by.

Last night I came across these lines from an old favorite book: "Tell me a love story. Not one you've read or heard. One you've lived." [Excerpt from TRUE LOVE by Robert Fulghum] I've got one alright. Hell, I've got tons! All of those are meekly tucked as chapters of my life. They say that life flashes right before your eyes at the face of death. But mine does every single minute that I live and breathe. I've always thought, "why wait to die when there are a heap of reasons to live and tell the tales?"

My chances of being the toast of tinseltown is slim to none, but I have a very long list for all the cheers I share, not with the "People Who Matter" but with the people whom I care about and love the most. I am a nobody in center stage, but I am somebody in the lives of the people who have shared moments with me one time or another. I lack the grandeur of a socialite, but not the steadfast understanding of society. I am rather unsure if I have actually come across the token of the five-minute fame one is supposed to be alotted with. But I am quite certain that for more than once in my life, I owned one full minute -- from the moment it happens until it finally takes its full turn.

I remember from my childhood years that candy, Butterball, and how sweet it tasted as I rolled it in my tongue. I could still feel those breathless laughter boiling up again when I am reminded of tripping over my own feet while I was goofing around with my college roommate. I still get teary-eyed whenever I put on the emerald earings that my Dad artfully wrapped inside nine or ten boxes layered, with the smallest tucked inside the bigger ones, for my 14th birthday. I could clrearly recall how my heart fluttered when I heard his voice from the other end of the line when he called me from the airport right before he boarded the plane. I could never forget feeling triumphant and quite pleased with myself after memorizing two whole pages of a Constitution I Law Reviewer by heart with literally having two bullets from my dear friend's gun tucked in my ears just to block the noise of the bustling street along the coffeeshop where we studied the whole night. And always, I would feel that excitement the moment I hit the sack and have my late-night phone chatter with my mom every single night before I sleep.

These are my one-minutes. And each time there is that certain twinkle in my eyes and a lasting smile that nothing, not one thing or being could ever take away from me. For one whole minute I know I am happy exactly right where I am. Everything else -- the fears, anxieties, pains, agitations and frustrations, are all completely abandoned.

It's 6:00AM, another day in the year of 2008. Sunrise. Fifteen minutes of my life have already gone by. But for a single fleeting moment that a whole minute takes its full turn, I have once again captured a small forever.