Christmas this time around

there aren't many images of tropical Christmas love so here

Christmas was pleasanter this time around. Even if it wasn't the same magical thing I've come to expect, a hangover from childhood as most everyone can attest to, in some respects it was more meaningful as I came to expect goodness and time spent with people who matter to you. It wasn't much about the material things. They were just secondary to showing how much you care for your loved ones. It was the first time I've felt this way. Must be some people's penchant for giving gifts rubbing off on me. It's kinda my first time to deliberately think about what to give not just for one or two people. In the beginning, thinking about what to give kinda paralyzed me. Well, once I was at the department store and shopping with a friend, somehow the choice became a bit easier. Indeed, it was fun wrapping them up later that night, discovering ways on how to give those department store wrapping personnel a run for the money. I also managed to watch both Gegen die Wand and Solino, which would be the basis for part of our group report report for my German class. They were very well made.

It was a really good time for me, making the most of wrapping up presents and watching well-developed stories. One about trying to break away from the conservative ways of family while trying to maintain the status quo with the housemate/husband she's come to start loving and how that same love has also changed the ways of a womanizing, troublemaking drunkard who, after his time in prison is now a reformed man. It's their chance to be what they once were, now that they are mature. The other one is about a smart Italian boy who grows up in Germany amidst the family's restaurant boom. He's influenced by a filmmaker who uses their restaurant as a location, and teaches him on some basic but fundamental things. His chance for a breakthrough comes but his Mom is finally diagnosed and, after finding out her husband has been cheating on her, goes back to their old village Solino and he has no choice but to go with her. His jealous older brother then steals the chance he made for himself along with his girlfriend. It is many years later when he's got kids and is about to marry that they reconcile. However, still no hope for the father who chose to stick with his pride.

Might I point out that things were also made the more pleasanter (now that I've started this whole compare/contrast thing) because I've fully healed from whatever heartbreak I was suffering from the past year. Indeed, I was even about to cry before Noche Buena last year. Since none of those thoughts or scenes repeated themselves this year, then I can safely say that that guy did have more than an effect on me (more than healthy in fact) than I would sometimes claim. That's not to say I'm entirely immune to whatever it was that had me going for him for some time. I can't help but be ambivalent about his actions and behavior in the office given that he's not the most popular person there right now. My whole team, even my TL, don't really hold him in good regard. Same goes with some, most(?) other employees... It's like this is him and the very few who stand by him on one side, and the rest of the office is on the other side. It's that bad. And where am I? Right there in the middle. Oh, if only he could be understood and he could understand better as well. All it takes is a little consideration, methinks.

Anyway, when he went to our part of the floor earlier last night to offer the VTO and I was then standing around since I was on offline, he still managed to acknowledge me. Not that I was expecting otherwise. But he also managed to blurt out a 'happy new year' and then looking at the list he was holding, much to the amusement (?) of one of my teammates who heard him. Dare I say that somehow warmed me? That in spite of all the tension and bad blood between my team and him (my teammates jeer on him and cheer on the failures his team is experiencing), he's still recognizing our connection, dare I say it, to even greet me, in front of them. I just want to make clear that there's nothing on my end anymore. It's just the after effects of the before. And this kind of attention from someone you craved attention from before is not so unwelcome, even if there should be no kind of expectation on my part anymore. It's more like a childhood crush that won't go away, moreso because of all the good feelings that person engenders. Really. And my girlfriends have concluded that it does take a certain type of guy to have that effect on you, sometimes no matter what they did or didn't do. Mine's not exactly your usual goodlooking guy, mind you. And until someone, with a stronger effect who can make you forget about all that, comes along, you'll be stuck in this same limbo for sometime. Well, that's it. I'm just airing out my feelings for one part of this whole nasty thing that's been going on for a while, long before I even had this week-long vacation from work, and with no one to share this to... There's the excuse right there in this Christmas-related post.