Semicolon; My Favorite Punctuation

Don't you just love semicolons? It's a cross between the Zen-like meditation of a period and the Lamaze-like breathing of a comma: relaxed, peaceful and therapeutic.

It's a punctuation that asks you to take a longer pause and to calmly separate your thoughts from each other. It reminds us to take our time and choose our words and sentences carefully. It does not allow us to jump from one thought to another the way a comma would tell us to, or to keep on enumerating our thoughts (in jagged breaths) the way a colon would ask us to.

Also, a semi-colon looks sexier than any of the punctuations. Who wants to have the ghastly vampire bite of a colon, the tearful pauses of a comma, the condescending and selfish attitude of an apostrophe, the hyper jumps of the of an exclamation mark, and the drunk and incoherent garble of the ellipsis? The semicolon is even a perfect balance between the Yin and the Yang, if you get my point (thank you, Freud).

If the punctuations were in a classroom, semicolon would be an exceptional student. Why? She (I'd like her to be a strong female) is the ever meticulous writer carefully drafting her compositions and the cautious math whiz slowly solving her equations. She'll be a varsity player of the volleyball team and her eloquence will land her on a spot on the debate team. I bet she'll even be crowned as the Prom Queen what with her glamorous looks and star quality.

Know what I think? I think we should set aside a day in actual homage of this humble punctuation. We'll call it Semicolon Day, of course. It's going to fall somewhere in June because it's the middle of the year and semicolon is one balancing-act punctuation.

On Semicolon Day, people will be required to put on their best suits and dresses, and everyone MUST bring with them their sunny dispositions. Frowning will be a big no-no. People's conversations all throughout the day will be punctuated by semicolons:

"This is one lovely day; thus, I won't allow it to be ruined by the spilled coffee, by the traffic on my way to work, or by my grumpy boss."

"I hope everyone gets a bit of sunshine this Semicolon Day; a smile from me will definitely brighten up their day." (Flashes a smile to a passing stranger)

And everyone will flash their smiles to every person they meet and people will wonder why it can't be Semicolon Day everyday.

So you see, semicolons should be given the attention it rightly deserves. I think it's high time that semicolons come out of the shadows of colon, comma, and period. Semicolons deserve to make a mark, too and what a sexy mark they would leave!

Addict

My good friend, Graziella Sigaya made this photo collage of me. I'm sniffing a coffee creamer here because it smelled good, but I ended up melting the the contents of one packet in my mouth. It didn't taste bad either.

Summer Class 2013

I was at first hesitant to accept the subject, Children's Literature load this summer because I wanted to just read and write and sleep for the entire break, but it turned out to be one of the best summer classes I've handled so far. Instead of focusing on Western children's literature, I gave extra attention to Philippine children's literature which I believe was more fun and rewarding, not to mention nationalistic.

These are some of the pictures from the Literary Press Conference that served as their final exam. They gave such an impressive performance. The pictures are scanned from their documentation scrapbook that's why they're quite tiny.

Literary Press Conference (Philippine literary characters only)

Maria Clara and Si Malakas at Si Maganda

 A Surprise Guest! Sir Jan Raymond Cabangal, one of my first STs.

A bevy of characters

Clockwise: Lam-ang, Filemon Mamon, Lola Basyang, Darna, Bathala and Pinya

Psych Me Up

I started my Ph.D degree last 2010 but I haven't checked any of my grades so far. I just checked them awhile ago and I was so happy that I got a flat 1.0 in my Abnormal Psychology! It gave me an extra boost to finish this degree. After I checked my grades, one of my teachers/colleagues called to inform me that she'll give me a Psychology 101 load this first semester. I'm floating somewhere in the clouds now. I can't wait! I'm going to handle two of my passions - Psychology and Literature this schoolyear 2013. I won't fail my teacher. I'll do my best, oh yes, I will.

Six Degrees of Separation

The American band The Script gave a new take on Frigyes Karinthy's theory of Six Degrees of Separation by categorizing it as a break-up song. Originally, the theory says that everyone and everything is six or fewer steps away, by way of introduction from any other person in the world so that a chain of "a friend of a friend"  statements can be made to connect any two people in a maximum of six steps (Wikepedia). Ever wonder how you and your new Facebook friend has at least one or more mutual friend? The Six Degrees of Separation explains that.

The Script on the other hand used it as the six steps of getting separated from one's lover after a break-up. This song speaks true of what happens in most break-ups. Just listen to the song in this link: The Script's Six Degrees of Separation. Enjoy!