Pride (In The Name Of Love)

One man come, he to justify
One man to overthrow

- Bono, U2


So there I was.
The third to the last evening of this month, gazing at my PC, checking my mail. I belong to more e-groups than I care to wave a stick at, so you can imagine what my Inbox looks like.. my Grade School batch list.. my High School batch list.. a Pinoyrock list.. a Pinoy docu list.. an underground Punk list.. a hobby shop list.. a comic book list.. and a few others I'm not at liberty to divulge, for fear that I would have to terminate you.. and of course, a smattering of personal e-mails every now and then.. but one particular e-mail caught my eye instantly; it was one from my son.


Jason is 16. He's my firstborn son. He has a brother, Jeremy, who's 13. Like most brothers, they are not alike. Then again, in a way, they are. Other than the usual traits, characteristics and idiosyncrasies, they're both my sons. Jason's much like your typical Third Year High School students.. effervescent and bubbly yet moody at times; but mostly happy-go-lucky. He has a soft spot for little kids. He's a cousin's cousin, who gets along well with them no matter how pesky little brats can get. He's not the sporty type, which is sort of a waste, as he's close to a flat 6', believe it or not, taller than me. I'm not much of the sporty type, either, so I dispense with the first-draft-pick fantasies. He's robust, making him stand out even more; but what really makes him stand out is his abilities with the computer. In a short span of time, he's surpassed what little so-called knowledge I may muster or hope to at any given time between now and the future. He is his school's official Webmaster, as well as the Moderator of a forum he created. No mean feat for a young man who's on the verge of college. Speaking of college, he has expressed his trepidation to pursue a Computer Science course, as he thought I might not agree with his decision. But I made it clear to him that I would not force him to take a course that he didn't wanted, and that I was cool with what he wanted. He might have forgotten I'm a cool Dad, but there you go. But these are my words, spoken through the mouth as seen through the eyes of a father.. Maybe I should let him do the talking instead.

My life is now divided into three or should I say four.
First I am a student in Claret School of Quezon City.
Third year high school. Why should I complain now that
the work load is through the roof, and teachers I have
now either have no control over the classroom and the
students would do anything they want or don't teach the
lesson clearly. I can't even concentrate on doing these
since after doing one from another subject, there is
another one piled infront of me.

Next would be being a webmaster for the school's website.
I have the resopnsibility to compile everyone's acquired
articles and arrange it so that we can post them at the
school's website. Everything about the school, from Nursery
to Fourth year high school. We have to get something that
happened from each division of the school and post them
on the internet. It is hard since most of my members just
want to play and only a few are really working. Plus, I can't
take them out since I would be short-handed in the upcoming
Cyberfair competition and Computer Week preparations.

Another one is being a forum admin in the site I created
myself. It was hard at the beginning, and it's harder now.
Since the members complain about this and that and I have
to edit a code that has gone wrong and it would take me
days to fix it and put it up again. And I suddenly lost
the reason why I made this forum site. Was it because
I was bored last summer, or was it because I wanted to
know what it's like to do that kind of work? Indeed it
inspired me to continue studying Photoshop. After making
banner after banner, I learned a lot.

Lastly is being a part of a family. Me, my brother
and my father. I lost my mother when I was about to
become 13. She died of cancer and the three of us are
struggling now to live together. But, inspite of our
differences, we still love each other. I always try to
forget my problems at home, yet they always come at me
like the wind hitting you. I don't know what to do now.
All I do now is do these one or two at a time.
But I'll hold on, and continue to live this life.
I don't know where this will take me, but this is
the path I chose.

Seldom do blog entries drive me to tears. But seldom do I get to read blog entries by my son. Well, like he said, in spite of it all, no matter what it is that comes at us like a runaway freight train or a gale force typhoon, we still love each other.
That's Jason.
My son.
I love you.