restless in a hotel room

i’m in a middle of something i cannot finish.

you see, i got this deadline looming to submit a report by friday. it’s my first time to get a short term consultancy after arriving home. my worry grows in direct opposite proportion to my progress in completing the job.

outside, several demolition trucks pound the pavement and produce irritating cacophonic sounds that burst their way through my hotel room window. not to be outdone, a number of cars are hooting long and loud, drivers crazed over the unavoidable traffic.
i sit and try to continue working. i’m failing miserably.

i feel restless. and i can’t put my finger on it.

rewind to this morning.

i found out when i checked my emails i didn’t get the one job i applied for. a job i’m not even convinced i wanted in the first place. still, rejection sucks.

after hearing about it via txt message (how did we communicate be4 txt msgs?), friends offer a plethora of platitudes over the disappointing news. you’re over-qualified. they don’t know what they missed. something better will come along. they all mean well but how do you cheer up somebody who’s not feeling down?

just restless.

like many gay men before me i seek to soothe my restlessness with a pilgrimage to the mall and a healthy dose of retail therapy. a new pair of shoes (red sneakers from diesel), graphic novel (300), a couple of dvd’s (enchanted and apocalypto) and a further dent in my bank account later, i wait for the rush acquiring new stuff for my collection brings. it wasn’t forthcoming.

i remain restless.

back in the hotel room, i watched enchanted but my real life twist is that even disney’s happy ending cannot distract me from my restlessness.

back to the now.

i open my mac and start fiddling with the keys. instead of ending procrastination i find myself opening my g4m account, my ym and gay.com. there were the usual headless half-naked masculine demigods in the gay sites. i toyed on the idea of batting for an SEB. maybe jp (my partner) will fancy a 3-way when he comes back from his business meeting. i pondered the odds (30 and 40-something couple in a sea of 20-somethings, leo de caprio on his profile turning out to be harvey keitel in real life) and the gay sexual politics (no chubs, no effem, no pics, trip lang, discreet, etc. etc.) of the prospect and ditched the idea. but i kept on looking at profiles telling myself window shopping is not the same as buying.

i was more restless than ever.

a high-school friend of mine interrupted my eye candy surfing when she ym’d me. she just moved to sydney from london. she’s saying i should move there, too. i said i need to figure out what i want to do. she said i should teach or go for another post in one of the do-gooder organisations. she didn’t understand why i don’t have a job yet after resigning from an overseas post months ago. she said i was smart and asked why i am not using my considerable contacts. i said i think it’s not the problem of finding a job, it’s finding a job i like.

her lines lost the familiar smileys. she asked what i was looking for. she said as a nurse, she washes wrinkled butts and empty bedpans.

suddenly, my internet connection was cut. smart broadband is not so smart after all. i tried to reconnect but ym won’t work.

my restlessness turned to feeling bad.

i wanted to tell my friend i was a jack ass. that i don’t know if i can find any job. that hers was an enviable position because it has inspired sharon, nora, vilma, claudine, piolo and aga (to name a few filipino movie greats) to thespian feats that break millions of hearts. and that’s just the local movie industry.

as a charity bunny i only get angelina. and despite the big lips and unrealistic haute couture in a backdrop of exotic places where men who speak in foreign tounges kill each other, that movie flopped.

its past midnight and the trucks stopped pounding outside.
i gave up pretending i will work tonight. i went to bed and wondered if any of the worlds poor and disadvantaged cared if i ditch my lofty aspirations, got off my non-profit high horse and become a caregiver.

i thought of wrinkly butts and found the image not particularly distasteful. i started to mentally audition a-list filipino actors who will (yet again) gather critical and box-office success when they re-enact my (future) travails for the big screen.

no longer restless, i started to drift off to sleep.