THERE is a heaviness on your chest filled with roles you need to do – sibling, friend, child, leader, employee, lover, adult, artist (not in particular order). You’ve been carrying this for awhile but the recent months have taken a toll on you. Much like a bamboo, you try to be flexible and took on the roles as much as you can. You got burnt out.
To cope, you turn to music. Reading isn’t as pleasurable as it once was. As hard as you try, the words don’t become movies in your head anymore. Instead, you put your headphones on and press shuffle on Spotify.
Listening to music doesn’t require so much brain power, really. You don’t even have to actively listen to it either. You just let it play in the background. There is comfort in white noise.
So at night, you lie on your bed as you crank up the volume. You close your eyes and imagine you are Eleven inside a sensory deprivation tank. You sing along with songs by Paramore, Fall Out Boy, Eraserheads, and other musicians the app recognizes you like based on your listening behavior and their algorithm. You smirk at how an app can recognize what you want and yet you’re still struggling to figure out what you actually want in life.
The songs feel like a warm body lying beside you. And then an unfamiliar song starts. Its guitar intro transports you to a time when someone dear to you before played a similar chord progression. Just in a different tempo.
The song holds you. The vocals are familiar but you just can’t place it.
The lines go: Sa gabing kay dilim/ hinahanap ko ang/ kahulugan ng mga/ panahong lumipas lang/ nang walang pasintabi/ ako ay iniwan/
The song hits you like cold water. You open your eyes, hit pause, and see your all-time favorite singer/songwriter’s name, Armi Millare, under the title, Kapit. Damn it, Spotify. And thank you.
You hit play as you are reminded of the many nights when your mind wanders to the past. Regrets you’ve buried deep surge in your mind. They play like Vietnam War flashbacks onscreen. You wonder what if and conjure imagined alternate universes with better outcomes to put your mind a bit at ease. You can’t help it. Hindsight is always 20/20.
The song continues: Mga matang noon ay/ may kislap pa, ngayon ay/ mugtong-mugto, sanay sa luha... You used to be wide-eyed. You had the audacity to shoot for the stars. Even if you missed, there’s a chance you’d hit the moon. What could go wrong?
Pilit sa putik aking pupulutin nang isa-isa/ mga pangarap kong nabasag/ tila bubog sa paa
A series of failure and disappointment happened. You steered too many lifetimes in one lifetime. You lost control.
Oh, hihigpitan ko ang kapit sa Diyos. /Maliwanag na rin./ Ito na’t parating./ Matatapos ang lahat ng pagsubok na ‘to.
As the strumming fades, you find the irony in “Let go and let God”. The light breaks the night that covers you and the heaviness on your chest dissipates.