For Algernon

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"Charlie, you amaze me. In some ways you're so advanced, and yet when it comes to making a decision, you're still a child. I can't decide for you, Charlie. The answer can't be found in books -- or be solved by bringing it to other people. Not unless you want to remain a child all your life. You've got to find the answer inside you -- feel the right thing to do. Charlie, you've got to learn to trust yourself."
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excerpt from Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes
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The past few weeks had been crazy so I apologize for the silence. I had been avoiding going online and checking email and all the good stuff because somehow, besides being super busy looking for a place every weekend, I had found it quite pointless to exhaust myself over a virtual world when I could've been channeling that constructive thoroughness into my real world. After failed attempts at establishing connections with people trying to dig deeper into possible relationships, my guru had advised me to enter a brief moment of reflection outside the realm of telephone wires and stratospheric message sending. He even lent me a buddhist meditation booklet for people on the go and on the side, I read Charlie's "progris riports" on how to be smart in the novel Flowers For Algernon by Daniel Keyes. So there, after a couple of days' abstinence from cybernetwork contact, I fell into a sudden and unexpected state of despair and self-pity. HAHAHAHAHA!!! As if I didn't expect that wouldn't happen, and I mean, not that what I had felt were baseless neuroses from perceived infantile abandonment upon the birth my my younger sister (and then my youngest sister) during my toddler and adolescent years respectively, but the realizations came in heaving fire like demons from limbo, to the point where I had convinced myself that I needed therapy or exorcising(!) ASAP. I'm ok now. It had come after I talked to an officemate about movies and stuff. The brief encounter helped me snap out of the feelings of defeatism caused by the repressed desire for intimacy; the challenges of racing against the dynamic currents while traveling in a comfortably buoyant ship.
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We were supposed to pay the landlord last Sunday and finally be able to move stuff in by this Saturday. But alas, beautiful things have their ugly challenges. The landlord refused to accept post-dated checks that weren't under our names as signatories for the 2-bedroom unit. Why don't we have checking accounts yet you may ask. Well, let's see: My guru and I work 10am to 7:30pm everyday Monday to Friday. Unfortunately, the bank that holds our savings isn't open on Saturdays and their minimum maintaining balance is quite high. With this we had to let go of the offer. Forutnately, we had been nice to our broker (who talked to the agent who talked to the owner through sms.) She's offered to refer us to other units available if and when she sees some. Now that's something; It does help to be nice and polite sometimes.
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I do hope we find a place soon. I'm so excited at the prospect of being dirt poor whilst enjoying the privacy and personal space I've been craving for, especially now that I'm more serious in working up a sweat with the pieces of advice my guru has prescribed for me. Until that point where we can find our new home, it's gonna be a stiff rat race between my team and those other groups who're also looking for 2-bedroom units in the metropolis.
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With each turn of the maze, each whiff of the bait, I learn more about doing things on my own. It won't be soon when I beat the other rats in the race. Till then, I'll lay like flowers for Algernon.
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