Clichéd as it may sound, I really want to be a better person. I want to start focusing my energy into something that doesn't involve sex and inappropriate men for a change. My friends would roll their eyes if they read this and for good reason. I've had this bouts of reform ideas before, and they usually last a couple of days on average. But I'm 25 now. I'm not getting any younger, and I feel like I'm chasing my tail around in circles. So, for the past few weeks, I've been doubling my efforts at being an adult.

I find myself in the office more and more often now. I even come in on my days off. I've clocked in hours and hours of overtime to catch up on my work and earn those precious extra pesos so I can pay off my credit cards faster. I finally bought insurance. Though I still travel as much as I can, I have cut corners in some of my usual senseless expenses. I'm even taking my writing more seriously. Since I pretty much realized its something that I do often enough, I figured why not start earning from it? I needed the extra income, and it would officially make me a professional. I imagined myself saying, "Hi, I'm Iris. I'm a writer." and I got the chills. So, I networked. I met this fabulous girl, Chin, in Multiply (She's awesome and I've become a huge fan of hers.) and worked up the courage to ask her for tips on how to get freelance work. She showed me where to start and got me on the right direction, so now I have a part-time job. I practically had to beg my new boss to let me start small, just 2-3 articles a day, and she was kind enough to let me. I've barely even started, and I could already feel the pressure of meeting deadlines and writing about things I absolutely know nothing about. I can't imagine how I could do 6 articles in a day, which is what would be required of me in a couple of weeks. But strangely enough, I've never felt so alive. And nothing could have prepared me for what I felt when I finished my first ever article. There are no words to describe it.

This week I've barely sleept four hours each day. I'm tired and cranky as hell. I've got QA work to do and articles to finish. But I'm not complaining. For the first time in my entire life, I know I'm finally growing up.

So I'll be thinking it over for the next few days. Maybe I'll get used to these ugly Google ads. Maybe they will miraculously disappear. What I do know is, if I'm going to make a move, I'll have to do it soon while the number of posts I have are still under control.

I have just finished scrubbing my share of the agents' CSAT (customer satisfaction) data for March. (Scrubbing means cleaning it up, obviously without the use of brushes, Zonrox, muriatic acid, and what-have-yous.) There are almost two thousand lines of data that we need to painstakingly go through. I've been at it since 5PM and its now past midnight. I am cross-eyed and disoriented from staring at Excel for too long.

We have a new call list this week, meaning I have new agents to rate. I used to have 15 agents under my bucket, and at 6 evaluations per month, that's already quite a stretch. Now I have 25 agents. 25! I haven't even started on a single one because that there are supposedly more pressing matters to attend to. I take one look at my list, and I want to weep. On the bright side, I am finally free of a certain agent who has been the bane of my entire QA existence. Don't get me wrong. I love my agents. I cut them some slack as much as I can. But this woman is just impossible. She's older than everybody else, which is probably why she's so difficult. She has the lousiest communication skills and her grammar is just off. She starts out all sweet and syrupy, then suddenly becomes rude and sarcastic. She doesn't comply with the standard spiels and has the worst analogies possible. And her voice, well, don't even get me started on her voice. For 3 months, I suffered with her on my list. And for 3 months, she hasn't passed a single evaluation. Not one. She's that bad, and I'm so glad I don't have put up with her any longer.

I'm currently on the night shift, validating the agents' upsells real-time. Its boring work. All we do is sit around and wait for the agents to call us. I would have liked to use the time to squeeze in some evaluations but it totally sucks when you get interrupted every so often to listen to agents reading a script for "compliance and auditing reasons". I swear, I can recite the whole spiel in my sleep. If we miss the upsell calls, then we have to search high and low for the recordings and validate those. God forbid that we don't find those recordings because if the agents are whiny, their Team Leads are whinier.

Oh, how I long for the days of old when we QAs picked our schedules and spent our hours sleeping, malling, and generally doing nothing. Yes, some good things just never last.

All my life I've been plagued with wanderlust. But I wasn't born to luxury. Me and my sister were raised by mum single-handedly. Except for the occasional trips to visit relatives in Manila, I've never been away from home. Still, I dreamed. I'm a voracious reader, and I found myself getting lost in the exotic places of the books that I read. I have sailed on a gondola on the canals of Venice, sat in a bistro on a quaint Parisienne street, and climbed each one of Lisbon's seven hills. I have partied in Ibiza, seen the full moon in all its splendor in Koh Phangan, and experienced the magic of Egypt. I swam with dolphins and made snow angels. I have been everywhere, if only in my head. I promised myself that before I died, I would have seen the world twice. My goal was to work hard long enough to save money. Then I would backpack through Europe and the rest of the world alone, and live simply.

But I grew up, and life happened. I suddenly had work to do, bills to pay, and responsibilities I can't ignore. At 25, I'm nowhere near achieving my goal. That dream seems so far away now, and I fear that I will be an old woman by the time I can save enough to visit all the places I want to go to. I have come to accept that unless I win at least a million pesos in the lottery, backpacking through Europe is not feasible for a person of my background.

Still, I can't shake off the itch. So I travel where I can when I can afford to. This year so far, I've travelled to Manila, Alcoy, and my beloved Bantayan. And thanks to Cebu Pacific's really affordable seat sale rates, I am going to Boracay next month and (drumroll please) HongKong in October! Finally, my first trip abroad, and I am uber excited. Of course, budget is limited so, apart from visiting the requisite places (Disneyland, Ocean Park, Victoria Peak, etc.), its really nothing fancy. I'll be staying in hostels (Hopefully, I'll meet a hot backpacker or two!) and will probably be living off cup noodles for days but who fuckin' cares? I'm going to HongKong!

My dream might be delayed but its far from over. I'll take it one step at a time, one country at a time. Yes, HongKong will be the first of many. Never has an itch been more pleasant.

I know I should start accepting the fact that it really was just a one night stand and we can't move past that. I have to believe that there's no room in his life for me, that we don't belong together, the he has probably forgotten me by now, and that he never cared. Its the most logical thing to do, and the sooner I embrace that, the sooner I can move on and get my life back.

But he did call me that night. I had let him go. I had said my goodbye. It should have been over then, but he did call me. I know its crazy to base my decisions on a stupid phone call, but why would he bother? I don't know him well enough but he didn't strike me as someone who would waste his time, unless he really meant it. Of course, I could be wrong. I'm sure he has his reasons, and whatever they are, I'll probably never know.

I still don't want to believe that he and I can't be together, that he can't be mine. I love him, and that has to mean something. After all this time I'm finally in love again, and its hard to accept that its all in vain. But I'm also afraid to wait because I don't know for sure that there is something I'm waiting for. It is all too confusing. I don't know what to think, even what to feel. This utter helplessness is agony. I am exposed. I am vulnerable.

If pain must come, may it come quickly. Because I have a life to live, and I need to live it in the best way possible. If he has to make a choice, may he make it now. Then I will either wait for him or forget him. Waiting is painful. Forgetting is painful. But not knowing which to do is the worst kind of suffering. - By The River Piedra, I Sat Down & Wept by Paulo Coelho