MiSeDuCaTiON # 20: GHOST TOWN.

DO YOU BELIEVE IN GHOST? 

I grew up hearing lots of different stories about ghosts in our small neighborhood in Pasay City. My friend’s sister  Joan, once claimed she saw one of our friend Jeffrey, waving goodbye as he went inside dark the corner beside a parked truck… just a few days after his death.

 

 

I, also claimed to see one. The only thing is… this kind that I have can really bite you in reality. The ghost that gives me a total fright just by a single thought of it. The kind that makes me lock inside my room the whole day and almost shook me from within.

 The Ghost of My Past.

Once in my life.. I had a childhood. And I never thought how fragile it was to be of age 7 until someone made a scar on my early memory. My Older brother’s friend, Bill* abused me, sexually. At first, I thought he only wants to join me in my playing but I’m wondering why was he leading me to the comfort room. From there he made me do things little one shouldn’t know, He made me touch something that I have and I swear to ___ I don’t know why I have to relinquish my young strength to his persuasion. I know perfectly  it only happened once… but the effect is still vivid and alive. It’s following me… giving me the chills of heavy guilt….And it’s been haunting me eversince.

But my curiousity led me to a habit. And my habit, is starting to create an addiction. But before it even grow to create a character which I ghastly refuse to become… I decided to put an action to it.

I tried everything to get away from it. Even if it takes moving to another city and has cost me to be away from my closest friends. I tried to keep it from everybody else and pretend it doesn’t exist. But somehow, the more I tried to keep it.. the more it became powerful. Real and intense.

So, I tried to change. I tried to change my environment.  I tried to change the way I live. Cutted off some huge amount of friends that might endulge me to do it and I even tried changing my beliefs about the Maker and cling to my religion to make it totally disappear. And I’m glad I made a way to battle the fear it has made on me. One day I woke up feeling it wasn’t there anymore and I’ve never felt so healthy than before. SO I MADE A CONCLUSION THAT THERE IS NO GHOST TO SCARE ME ALL MY LIFE.

Until,many years later… I saw myself working in an office heading to the Comfort Room. Inside, I saw a man staring at me on the mirror. His eyes were fixed straight at me that somehow made me feel uncomfortable.But then I tried to overcome the growing chills on my back by being brave enough to offer my left hand and promptly introduced myself…but the moment he reached my hand, thinking it’s a call for a firm handshake, I knew there was something beaneath this man that gives me the goosebumps. And as his hand pulled mine to invite me to touch “his private” that puts me into a deep state of shock, I knew, right there and then-THE GHOST OF MY PAST IS BACK.

I was immediately captured by a whirlpool back in the time I first met my ghost. The situation and the feelings was familiar and nostalgic. I became the 7 year old trembling kid again whose fears came up to every piece of his hair, reluctantly giving the man infront of him the freedom to do his own will. I was as weak as I were again, so I’ve watched history repeated itself while  the “Ghost” took all the advantage to do it all over again. 

And the next thing I know… I was there, sitting alone inside the washroom cubicle, curled up… petrified, and I’m 29 again. The temperature went back to normal, but my sanity wasn’t. I’ve never felt so bad about myself as much as I felt for that day. As the fact of the matter, It only made me feel more worst and confused about myself hundreds of times more than before.

I thought I’m brave enough. I thought I’d never let this happen to me again. And I thought THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS GHOST. -YET WHY DOES IT SCARES ME TO DEATH?

This question brought me to realization to think what I have done. I know  that somehow, inspite my rationalization… I am also responsible for every action that I chose to do. I forgot that I am my own master to choose what I will. And I know now what is RIGHT from WRONG. And that I’m only human who was given my own set of  weaknessess to humble myself enough to know that I needed to learn from my own mistakes. Even if sometimes, it’s the same exact mistakes that I’m still trying to battle over and over again until I become perfect in it. And I know it’s not the GHOST of my past that really scared me the most.

- IT”S MY OWN GUILT.

So, everytime I visit my old block in Pasay, or wash my face infront of the mirror inside a comfort room, I KNOW IT”S THERE. It feels like a shadow breezing over me everytime I remember what happened in my past. And it keeps on haunting me if I will not take heed and follow my instincts. And it reminds me of how it feels like being scared again. Every place where I commited my mistakes suddenly will turn out to be like a ghost town.

BUT YOU CAN BEFRIEND THIS GHOST ONLY IF YOU WILL LEARN TO CHOOSE THE RIGHT AFTER IT REMINDS YOU THE AWEFUL FEELING THAT TORMENTED YOU FROM YOUR MISTAKES. AND I KNOW EVERYONE  HAVE THIS KIND OF GHOST IN US TO HELP REMIND US NOT TO MAKE THE SAME MISTAKES AGAIN. AND THERE’S NO WAY WE CAN EVER ESCAPE IT… IT LIVES WITHIN US.

 -It’s called CONSCIENCE.

~ ni themiseducationofzapped sa Disyembre 2, 2008.