Sovereignty

History now sees it as a faint ripple in a distant pond of memory, of that late evening spent in a friend’s living room a few blocks away from my work place. Over a couple of bottles of beer, we quietly rejoiced over my new found freedom. Five years of enduring a train of abuses and inequalities, and now it was all over. That evening, I penned the words of my secession and sent it using a colleague's cell phone. My friend who lives nearby was the first to hear the news and a toast was made under a dim light coming from a lampshade not far from our table.

I compared my situation to an upstart nation, whose founding fathers have recently put into paper its desire to chart its own destiny. The mother country, receiving the declaration would have been traumatized to make a response. Nevertheless, preparations are being made to reclaim a breakaway territory. Expeditionary forces would soon arrive after the celebrations and no matter how the nation readies itself from such an onslaught, the struggle to move on will take a long time before a conclusion will be made.

We still remember the first time my lips spoke the words "I am single." It did put a genuine smile on my face. Such words overwhelmed me that my bones were shaking every time I am being reminded of my liberty. But in the course of time, such words became too heavy to carry on my back. Freedom has a price which I am not ready to hold on my own. Thus, the string of boys became my story. Affair after an affair, a potential union going down the drain, a one night stand surrendered believing it would lead to attachment, a recurring tragedy which in the end made me weary of my own singlehood. We used to believe that I deserve someone better, but in the end we are beginning to see that the person who deserves me more is none other

but me.

So we learned to stop seeking and let the boys run wild beyond my nation's borders. Others, whose unions I have witnessed a few months back have now been torn apart. There is only bitterness, if not for some speck of light that such brokenness would lead to a more cordial approach. There are still unions, whose binding thread remains straggling against the impossible odds. In this kind of relationship, it seems one is bound to be the subject of another. There is no perfect union like all of us have dreamed of in the beginning.

We realize that maybe, the love story we desire only exist in the realms of imagination. That is why we called for a retreat and a pause for all the searching in hopes that such break would make us see the worth of our hard earned sovereignty...

Make no mistake, I still aspire of ending up with someone in the future. The daydreams hold sway when I published an epilogue to immortalize the defeat my own scorpions last month. However, actions reveal that my longings merely stand on shallow grounds; that my desire lies in the thrill of falling in love but not with the settlement that should come with it.

No one, who wishes to secure a new lover would give up his time building up his physique instead of reaffirming a shaky bond. The gym is a temple of fitness but it is also a barracks for those preparing to engage a possession war with an other. The club nights continue, despite the prodding of friends to remain seated on the bar stool as we down buckets of San Miguel Light every weekends. The weekly pilgrimage to the dance floor allows us to choose different unions with fellow seekers. Only our firm resolve to move as far away from the cravings of the flesh separates us from being used as a booty call after the party is over.

Finally, our priorities over work, over family, and over friends leave us no time to engage ourselves in soulmate searching. Until someone stumbles on our field - who shares the same mind, same interests and same values shall we truly learn to give up our sovereignty over a union with someone who rightfully deserves us.

The month of June had left us in peace.

After we decided to abstain from all matters of the heart.

And with this, we open the new month looking back at how it was on the eve of our freedom. For in these recollections shall we learn the very reasons why we should remain free and why we should not let singlehood burden us with loneliness.

I am my own life.

We shall never submit ourselves to abuses and demands from anyone again.