Last Eight Days with X

I'm already looking forward to the day after X, to be free of X, at last! 

X has given me an umbrella in the last nine years, almost 10 years to be exact. He has protected me against storms, mostly financial ones; most of all, he  has protected me from Covid, at least, since he has given me a home, a roof over my head here in downtown Davao, in an area very accessible to everything that I and my family need so that we could not really feel the extent of the horror of the lockdown all throughout the pandemic. It was like living in a protective bubble. Although we are aware of the risks and the danger everywhere, we feel where we were a basic sense of safety. During the times when the outside world seemed to be going mad, we were able to retreat to our sense of safety, here in our bubble, thanks to X. 

X has also allowed me access to some privileges, reduced the fear and anxiety I've been carrying with me since childhood, protected me against the harshness and prejudices of fellowmen and women, etcetera, etcetera. It was because of X, or at least with the stability that X provided, that I was able to explore oil painting, watercolors, pastels and embarked on my journey to self-discovery. It was X who allowed me to travel, to find adventure in several places, to go wayward, sometimes, without adverse cost to myself.

Now, I'm saying goodbye to X. Because even if X was really a good provider, he was also ruthless, cruel, egocentric and rigid in his own beliefs. Through the years that I've been with X, X had never seen me. Or, is it right to say, he refused to see me. He has always treated me as invisible although through these years, I've been doing work for X. 

These are my last eight days with X. I can't describe yet how I feel. Excited by the prospect of my impending freedom? Afraid of losing all the privileges I used to enjoy? I'm supposed to write a goodbye letter to X but right now, I can't do it yet. I'm still trying to still myself, I'm still trying to console myself because I feel so broken. 

No Exit

"Do people ever sleep there?" the taxi driver asked, pointing to the boxlike structure where I came from. "That building has always been alive until morning," he observed.
"The newspaper never sleeps," I said, explaining. At that hour, the production people were  still about to take their turn printing tomorrow's newspaper. The editors--I work as a copy editor, so, me included-- had just closed and approved the pages.  They had to see to it that they were there when they the page closed to ensure that everything that came out passed under editorial scrutiny.
"But people need sleep," he said. "Who goes there in the morning?"
"After the production people finish printing," I continued, "The newsboys come in at dawn to get the papers and deliver them to the newsstands. Sometimes, they also deliver the papers right at the subscribers' doorsteps. At eight, the business and advertising people come. So, are other office workers, like the editorial assistants, in the newsroom. The day desk editors also come in to see to it that reporters pursue the latest news stories for the day. In the afternoon and towards the evening, the reporters start trickling in to write their stories. Then, afterwards, it's editing time all over again."
It was already half past 12 in the morning when I talked to the taxi driver on my way home. Late in the morning, I went to the laundromat and watched the washing machine, and then, the dryer, spin. "The newspaper is one huge machine," I couldn't help mumbling.
The man running the laundromat who kept asking where I worked, looked up.
"Well, I work for a huge machine that never stops churning," I said, and marveled at the irony of my words. I thought, "I don't think I could ever serve a machine, no matter how big."
Then, I started dreaming of going to a far flung place where no machine could ever reach me. Instead, I conjured images of the remote mountains of Mindanao, where the machines were more deadly. People getting killed by another type of machines---the machine guns--right in the places where they lived.
With the Human Security Act, policies that cater to the World Bank and the global capitalist system, debt servicing, the deregulation of everything, privatization even of health services and more, even governments can be deadly killer machines.
Societies, civilisation  are machines that demand subjection from everyone within reach. Even the groups fighting for change have to invent their own "machine." 
Probably, in this life, there's no escaping from the rule of the machine. But isn't it terribly sad?