thebenzene - Tumblr blog

thebenzene · 20 days

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Parang wala lang sa’yo lahat. Paano ‘yun sa’yo? Sa akin ‘yun na lahat.

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thebenzene · 1 month

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I will get there. I promise.

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thebenzene · 2 months

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My baby cat

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thebenzene · 2 months

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Palestinian women throw stones at the Zionist occupiers during clashes on International Women’s Day, at Qalandia checkpoint in the West Bank, Palestine, March 8, 2014. (Photos: Majdi Mohammed / AP Photo)

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thebenzene · 2 months

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There is still hope. Say it out loud. Palestine will be free. The Palestinian people will celebrate their culture and heritage with each other. We will love and be loved. Do not fall into the trap of despair.

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thebenzene · 2 months

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Whenever you feel like sinking when you lie on your bed just like how a dead body is set in a casket, don’t be afraid to sink. You will not sink, you will not drown, you will not die. Do not resist for the waves will take you somewhere safe. If it’s not yet your time, you will not die. There will always be a conflict between your mind and your body. Whatever you think, you see, you hear, you feel, you only have one body — and that is what makes you alive. The mind is a prison. You will be made believe that you are in a constant state of disorientation, that your mind does not belong to your body, that the material world is not yet what it is, that you have to experience transcendence from time to time, and that you are forever trapped. Darling, listen to me. You are your body and you are your mind. Whatever happens to the mind, the body must withstand; whatever happens to the body, the mind must tolerate. For the battles are in different realms, the ego must be grounded in the physical reality. Machines can only do so much to observe and interpret the brain state but no entity in the known universe can be of contact to get into the dimension of your mind.

Whatever happens, stay in touch.

Whatever you hear, stay in touch.

Whatever you see, stay in touch.

Your body, your head, you have your eyes, you have your ears — move, observe, see, hear, touch, smell, walk. Are you here with me? Do you hear me? Feel. Your heart is beating. Can you feel that? Can you hear that? Now close your eyes. Don’t be afraid of the void. Relax. Stay connected. Do you feel that? Don’t lose yourself, darling. Whatever happens, don’t stay out of your body. You hear me?

Now, sink.

Stay in touch.

Sleep

and let your psyche take over.

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thebenzene · 3 months

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So a free tool called GLAZE has been developed that allows artists to cloak their artwork so it can't be mimicked by AI art tools.

AI art bros are big mad about it.

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thebenzene · 3 months

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end of the world

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thebenzene · 4 months

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Meeting my mom | January 24, 2024

I dreamt about my mom last night. But unlike any ordinary dream, I saw her caressing me — as a baby. I met her in the same age as I am right now. It feels so surreal that I am seeing myself in her. She was thin and frail, smiling just like how I do, and she even had my mannerisms. It seems like I am looking at myself in a parallel universe where I became a mom at a very young age. 22 was not young for her; but for me, it is. I could only look at her from a distance and there’s this very transparent glass that separates us, like a portal that brings you to the past, and I could only see her sitting at a chair while floating at a space in time. Words could not describe how I feel upon seeing her vulnerability — of taking a gamble on motherhood and marriage just because she doesn’t see a future different from that, the only plan she had in mind coming from a broken family. I wanted to cry but it seems like I can’t release tears in that dimension. It’s just a dream but it feels like seeing a mirror. It scares me how my mom was also once 22. She’s just a girl, yet she sacrificed her world, her vision, her dreams, because securing her future with my father was the only way out. She had no family to call her own, so she thought of creating her own. I must remind myself, too, that she was once my age, who had nothing in her mind but to care for her family, and in that dream, to take care of her small baby — me. It’s terrible to think of myself as a mother in the future. I can’t even fathom myself journeying the path of motherhood. In that dream, I saw my mom. She was young and totally determined to be a mother, something I thought that she wouldn’t right away have thought of, if she didn’t come from a broken family. Motherhood is not a curse, but I will always wonder if she had a life just like mine, would she still be my mother?

Nanay, in another universe, I hope you’re still my mom. But I would be happy even if you were not, just as long as you’re in a universe with your mother and father living together, faithful to each other and were present and supportive in raising you. In another universe, I hope your younger self didn’t have to marry at 19 to earn a sense of belonging and security.

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thebenzene · 6 months

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Anything that flows, anything that goes, anything where the wind blows, has an end. I remember my friend telling me about his most precious mechanical pencil that got broken. I simply replied, "Maybe it happens like that because everything depreciates." Whenever I clench my teeth, I kept on being reminded that even these strongest enamels will soon start to weaken and crack, because as we get older, we're bound to decompose. Whether it'd be a natural death or an untimely demise, a death means death —ceasing to exist, being exterminated in this mortal plane. And right now, as I think of the next words and clauses to type, as each of my finger presses on the keys of this laptop, as I move my eyes from left to right upon ensuring that I have registered the precise thoughts, I am aging. I am moving through space and time. I am nothing different from my friend's mechanical pencil's spring mechanism that has been broken, nothing different from the very same teeth in my mouth that are being weakened as I use it every time to munch and savor my food. My friend can use his pen cautiously and I can take care of my teeth gently, for sure. Yet, everything depreciates.

Depreciates? But matter cannot be created nor destroyed. Well, depreciation does not mean destruction. When something depreciates, it loses value compared to its prime form. Maybe a lot of people wouldn't find it useful anymore, but it could be of another use to fewer ones. Maybe the broken pen could be melted and recycled again to make another form of plastic and the spring could be incorporated again into a bigger body of alloy. Maybe my teeth could be a nice fertilizer when I die, or it could be an archaeological material million years from now.

Everything that flows, everything that goes, everything where the wind blows, transforms. Energy cannot be created nor destroyed. Not to talk about entropy and enthalpy, but I believe everything is interconnected. From the very first civilization up to this very present day, we are a continuing entity.

"The cosmos is within us. We are made of star-stuff. We are a way for the universe to know itself." - Carl Sagan

"Life is the universe experiencing itself, in endless variety." - Alan Watts

The six degrees of separation states that it will only take a maximum of six steps for someone to connect to someone else, even though they are not totally aware of each other's existence yet. We are one and we share the same primal instincts. We are sentient. We are different yet very much the same.

And I hope, that in the mundanity and complexity of this life, may we not fail to find joy in the everyday. Just like finding glimmer in consuming a soft-served ice cream under the heat of the sun, familiarizing the texture of the insides of your sneakers as you take your morning jog, finding nostalgia in the aroma from the bakery upon passing by the street of your childhood, and savoring the sauce from your favorite lunch.

I hope, my dear, no matter how far life takes you, you will never be so disconnected from your own body. No matter how absurd things might seem to be, may you always find the moment in time to entertain your emotions, dance with your sentience, and indulge in the idea of yourself as a human being.

Breathe and feel as life consumes you. You'll be just okay. The universe can wait.

— thebenzene 2023

(webcam selfie with baby orange, rest in peace. i love you, baby orange. you're always in my heart, baby orange.)