When I was a little girl studying in a private school, our teachers used to ask us to bring all our books and notebooks to and from school every day. So I strapped on an extra large bag almost half my size. Before there was the fantasy character template of the pretty, goody two shoes, hunchbacked, provincial girl secretly carrying a sinister gremlin inside her hump that we seem to see so often on Philippine TV these days, there was me and my hump full of books. My mom says my gremlins were the reason why I shall forever be denied the chance to apply for jobs where 5’2” is a requirement.

My daughter doesn’t need to grow her own hump. Now, kids have Barbie and Batman on wheeled frames attached to handlebars to carry their books for them and make sure genes and not education are blamed exclusively for shortness.

When I was in high school, we stayed inside warm classrooms for nearly eight hours a day. Each classroom had a single ceiling fan. Each fan seemed to look browner every year. When our fan started to make weird noises, stories of students whose heads had been chopped off by the blades of a fallen fan started to circulate. That’s when asthma suddenly became a fad and a popular excuse to get permission to sit farthest from the fan.

My daughter goes to an air conditioned room where the only threat is the explosion of odor after twenty, small, sweaty bodies that had been out playing under the sun too long pile in. At least only the teacher has to get distracted. There are no thoughts of chopped heads to frighten the kids.

Yeah, my kid enjoys the comforts of wheeled contraptions and air conditioning. I hope that’ll mean she’ll learn a lot more to help her live better and wiser.

*Photo by Arvind Balaraman; www.freedigitalphotos.net

My brother told me I should wake up and smell the flowers. I did and I got allergies.

There! That’s exactly what some people don’t like about me. They think I’m too negative and that I will eventually attract all the universe’s negative forces, cause a planetary collision and forever eradicate my chances of happiness, peace and a group date with the care bears.

If I were to change, would that mean just cutting off a limb or growing facial hair? Will I still be myself or will I be one of Barney’s friends tomorrow?

This may or may not be who I am. I don’t know. If I can’t figure out basic multiplication (I still use my fingers), how can I figure out myself right this very minute?

There are others who find my acerbic flavor funny. I make them laugh and I make myself laugh. This is all really just for fun. I think the key to stay intact is to never use muriatic acid for marinating.

I was all happy and ecstatic when we finally decided to live on our own apart from my in-laws. Even the impending birth of a second baby didn’t stop us. Armed with determination and a tummy that was the only thing larger than my resolve, I moved heaven and earth to get us an apartment. The tummy helped a lot because everyone seemed all too eager to help me get around. It’s been seven months and I wish I can say we made the best decision.

Like most Filipino communities, we live in one where people are always friendly and helpful. There are just some nights though when scenes jump right out of a vampire book and I’d wish I read Twilight. That would have been bearable punishment compared to the cold, clammy sweat I bathe in every time the friendly neighbors start drinking, bickering, breaking bottles and destroying private property.

I used to live in a place where the neighbors sometimes mutated at twilight too but I had nothing to worry about. They all still seemed to recognize me in their hairy, fanged conditions. That’s thanks to the many long years of friendship forged by countless beer bottles that my own pet werewolf (my husband) has had with them.

Without familiar faces, I find myself losing more and more sleep watching over my human children. I’d probably sleep better if I had a silver stake beside me but all I have is a short wooden stick that probably can’t even hurt a cat.

A friend once asked me, “So what do you prefer, living in a place not your own but where you’re good friends with the drunkards or in a place of your own but where the drunkards are strangers?”

Tough question.

I read somewhere that women in Canada are given a year’s maternity leave, three months of which are paid. After a year, they can expect to have a job waiting for them. Wow!

It isn’t so bad here. Mothers get roughly two months off for normal deliveries or a little more than that after C-sections. The female body doesn’t take long to get up and running after childbirth. What’s really difficult is the separation. I remember crying when I had to leave my first baby to get back to work at which point my father-in-law took me to task and reminded me that I had to pull myself together and work for milk, diapers and seventeen years of tuition fees.

Two years after I gave birth to my eldest child, I decided to go freelance, a term I prefer to use for picking odd tasks in a constant state of panic to make ends meet. So by the time I gave birth to my second child, the situation was a bit different. I had another C-section but I couldn’t take time off from my laptop. I was hooked back to my virtual dextrose only after a few days in the hospital. I swear I could feel my intestines jiggling to the tune of Jingle Bells as I typed away.

Within a few days, my stitches popped and I nearly fainted. The doctor assured me that an ingrown nail with a sprinkling of nail fungi on the side was a far worse condition than my dislodged stitches but I just couldn’t help myself. One part of my wound was pouting like a pale lip. At night I dreamt of my gut and the possibility of finally getting intimately acquainted with them through Emperor Palpatine’s cavity infested grin on my belly.

But I survived and that belly grin is settling into a smiley smudge, a reminder that I have a lot to be thankful for even if I don’t live in Canada. I’m a live mother to two live, happy, healthy babies who still love me even if they can talk to me sensibly only on weekends after I’ve come off of my internet dependence.

I now personally know of two people who never finished school but are earning thousands of dollars a month online. One of them earns more than a hundred thousand pesos a month, more than what one top corporate executive I know of earns. Both these new acquaintances of mine know of several others in their circles who earn even more. Their common denominator? They all know how to sell themselves.

Should I tell my kids not to go to college and just focus on learning how to sell? I know of an eight year old who already earns dollars online through some basic form of online marketing and a teen who’s asking his mother if he can quit school so he can focus on selling website designs online. The question is a dangerous one that I’m not willing to confront or answer now or ever.

But it’s tempting to get twisted.

I graduated at the top of my class but I’ve since learned that the only way I can make money out of my academic achievement is if I have my medal melted. That’s if it’s even made of real precious metal and if I can risk being labeled persona non grata by my alma mater.

I’ve never really been at the height of financial desperation. Parenthood though can make people transform in crazy ways. I haven’t yet devolved into an automated sales spiel dispenser but I’m beginning to think I need to have some marketing skills injected into me fast. I’d imagine that would feel like having a huge chunk of squid stuck in my gut. Aside from math, science, computer and physical education, high school entrepreneurship also felt like some esoteric alien discipline designed to cause digestive disorders.

I don’t have much of a choice but to devour the esoteric and hope my intestines are strong enough to digest it. Two cute, wide-eyed kids wake up every dawn beside me. They kiss me good morning before they scream for milk. The older one is about to go to school and unfortunately I don’t think the school principal will kiss me good morning before screaming for tuition fees.

I need to gain financial skills fast but I need to be kind to my digestive system. I’m starting off with the 8 Secrets of the Truly Rich by Bo Sanchez. So far I haven’t suffered from indigestion, diarrhea or constipation yet. So far, it’s the only resource I’ve ever come across that makes me feel like business, marketing and investing are Barney and Friends.

I still honestly think education is vital because it helps build character but I wish our schools could drill into us more the importance of financial wisdom.

I will make it. I can do this. I will succeed. I will not have my academic medal melted.