Wordplay # 7: Christmas Break

  • Wordplay

Oh my goodness, it’s finally Christmas break. I used to be able to get a break earlier, but this year’s holidays landed on strange days, and December 24 was declared a working holiday (*shakes fist*) and then I don’t actually have a lot of leaves yet so I decided to just stay working until almost Christmas. Technically, I’m not really working anymore because who has the will to work in the past days? Not me. Anyway, it’s almost Christmas, and I feel like we’re still stuck in a limbo no thanks to the panini, but also…there are some normal things?… Read More »Wordplay # 7: Christmas Break

Wordplay # 6: Culminating Event

I love college romance, or at least, love stories that started during college. I think it’s because my college days were my favorite years, and sometimes I still find myself missing those days I’d walk down hallways to class or hanging out with my org at our designated tambayan. I don’t miss the exams and the despair of being unsure if I would pass a subject or studying all night for calculus exams, but I miss life being less complicated. I think that’s why I like writing about characters who met in college, or have backstories that trace back to… Read More »Wordplay # 6: Culminating Event

Wordplay # 5: Introductions

*taps mic* Does this still work? Is anyone still here? Soooo it’s been a while — and not just in this blog, but also on my Instagram (and even longer on Facebook). It’s not that I haven’t been around because if you follow me on Twitter, you’ll know that I am always there, and always talking about BTS. 😀 Life has been a whirlwind in the past months, and maybe I will write about it more in the next few days. Or if I don’t, some of it will probably find its way into the manuscripts I’m working on. That… Read More »Wordplay # 5: Introductions

One year later (aka a birthday check-in)

  • General

Hello, I’m a year older today!

Quarantine started a day before my birthday last year, so a lot of the jokes I made last time was how I almost could’ve celebrated my birthday if the quarantine had started a day or two later. It was funny then because things were just starting and we were all thinking that by June, things would be back to normal and we could pause the celebrations now and wait until things are over.

But obviously, that didn’t happen, and it’s far from over.

Celebrating a second birthday in the middle of a pandemic with more cases, virus strains and a dismal pandemic response is…something. I don’t really know how how to describe it, because maybe I haven’t processed it fully yet, to be literally in the same place and almost in the same situation one year after.

It’s not to discount the blessings. I’m thankful for my job, for good health, for my parents getting their first shot of the vaccine, for easy access to resources, for things to be happy about. Thinking about this and knowing I have these makes me seem ungrateful when I feel sad about everything else, and as everyone said at the start of all of this, we are all grieving for something. And that’s right…but as my boss once told me when she checked on me, we’re all grieving for the lifestyles that we lost, and no one has any idea how to do that.

And she’s right. I’ve been trying to come to terms with that in the past month — and by “come to terms,” I mean, recognize how I am doing right at the moment. Recognize if I’m feeling sad, or angry, or out of it, acknowledge the times I feel happy and not feel bad about it. To even set boundaries, because wow, I never realized how bad I was at that before all this time I’ve been at home. Maybe it’s really having that awareness of myself, instead of busying myself all the time when there are things I don’t want to deal with.

It’s not always comfortable…but well, growth happens when we’re uncomfortable anyway. As BTS sings, life goes on.

So anyway, hello to this new year. 🙂

Reading:

One Royal Christmas by Melissa Tagg (yes a Christmas book at this time), and The Tropetastic Kindness Bundle. My reading progress is abysmal, though, like I haven’t opened my Kindle in the past weeks. 🙁 But I kind of have a good reason for this, because in the past month I’ve been immersed in…

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A New Thing: The Tropetastic Kindness Bundle

So remember how I mentioned in a previous post that I was invited to join a project and I didn’t know if I would be able to do it because I “didn’t finish” anything in 2020?

Well, last Valentine’s Day, the first story I finished writing after a looong time was published in #RomanceClass’s #TropeTastic2021 anthology! 🙂

The Tropetastic Kindness Bundle

Kilig for a cause! Get your copy at kilig.pub/tropetastic.

The last time I wrote “THE END” on any story was in 2018 when I finished the last novel that I’m still working on now. Sure, I wrote some things last year, but it’s been a while since I wrote a brand new story with new characters (well, almost all of them are new, anyway). And I missed this feeling! Yeah, yeah, I write for a living so there is a thrill with finishing a blog post or article, but it’s a different high in finishing a story after years of struggling with it.

Read More »A New Thing: The Tropetastic Kindness Bundle