I'm....

The two words I hear the most and use all the time while I've been in New York, are two basic english words (or three if you get technical), they are, I'm Sorry.

In a city, where everyone keeps bumping into strangers in the street, where you the entire time kick, touch, knock, and block complete strangers, is easy to think, am I sorry for co-existing?

If you think about New York, you have to remember that Manhattan is a small tiny island, in which eight million people are in a constant rush to live their lives. If you add those two factors together, the only think that can come out of it, is chaos.

The sad part is though, we sometimes not even acknowledge the person who we're saying sorry to, we say it automatically, like if we were programmed to do so, we say the words, but don't feel them, we're afraid maybe? Afraid of having to realize that someone outside our persona is there, living, breathing, doing something?

We know there are more people, but for us they're all extras in our own reality-tv show, we're not sorry for bumping into them, they got in our way, remember, we're the stars.....

I just wish, I could hear less I'm sorry, and more "are you okay", I just wish that when i'm on the elevator with someone and I say: "Hi" and smile, i get a hi back, its not that hard...

I'm sorry...

The Simple Life

My first post in New York, you would think that I would post about how simple (due to the title) life is here. I don't have to go to a supermarket to buy food, I just have to go to www.freshdirect.com and order it online and they'll bring it right into my home, nor how easy is to pay my cellphone bill, just have to go online again, and cable/internet/phone bill (again online) or how cable here is great, I could be watching Grey's Anatomy, but damn you guys don't stop calling me to see how am I doing, what am I to do, oh well, just pause it, talk to you, then press play and keep on watching without missing a single minute....oh yes the simple life....

Wish it were that simple....that much of what I've said its soooo true...but, the other part, the complicated part....the "aaargh" I wish I could just ripp an arm so I don't have to do this ever again part, CLEANING...yes my friends, cleaning.

Most of the people that live in the Dominican Republic (y'know where I come from) if they are middle class and up, we have a maid or two, I was lucky enough to have two, one who always made whatever I desired for breakfast, lunch, dinner, I didn't have to worry about preparing my meals, washing the dishes, washing the pots, cleaning the table, I didn't have to do my laundry, nor to make my bed, not even to fold my laundry, I didn't do anything...

Most of you will say, well, making your bed, making sure your room is clean is part of your responsibilities, not the maids, but well my dear readers, for me it wasn't (only on sundays, and not even then)...

Now I live The Simple Life in honor of Paris Hilton and Nicole Ritchie's tv show...I may still have the credit cards, and shopping sprees, but when you're leaving on your own, and having to do everything, and have a life, and go to the gym, and to study, you just get really beaten up by the end of the day, and you still have to do the dishes.

Will I survive, The Simple Life?

Hit

golpeado
Originally uploaded by ale_to_rro.

The desicions we take, be them big or small affect, even if it is just a bit, our life. Since we are children, we picture what do we want to do in life, we see ourselves as astronauts, models, actors, lawyers, cowboys, hookers (well ok "escorts") . The point is, from that moment on we start walking the road that will eventually lead us to our final desicion.

The time spent between making this desicion and getting there, we spent it imagining what would happen, the new things we're going to do, the new places we're going to see, we get so lost picturing it that we forget what we're leaving behind, our loved ones, our friends, family, our life.

The true impact of this desicion will only hit us moments away from this change, this moment might be determined in days, hours, minutes, but the emotional wage its carries leaves us all bruised up and hurt, sometimes making us regret our desicion.

We shouldn't regret, we shouldn't try to find a loophole and wish it never happened, we have to remember that the pain will pass, the bruises and the scars will heal, and that our loved ones, if they really love us and we love them as much as we say, we'll never be appart. You can always visit (or receive the visits) talk to them by phone, email, mail, and for that special someone ,a long weekend getaway.

To triumph sometimes we have to make big and small sacrifices, but if we keep a clear head, and know exactly what we want out of life and work towards getting it, everything will turn out great. The only thing left to do is to embrace the future and keep the past close to your heart.

Because you're Unreachable, that's why

brad_pitt
Originally uploaded by ale_to_rro.

Haven't you noticed how you can spend your entire life dying for someone, just thinking about that person night and day, just wishing you could be with them just for a second....hey, reality check you just want to be with them, because they're unreachable, that's why...

We've seen it with movie stars, women lose their balance just thinking about Brad Pitt, or Tom Cruise, men get hard just thinking about Britney Spears or Angelina Jolie, and we just can't figure out, why this hotties when they get together they don't last.

I'm pretty sure that thousand of women would say right here right now that they would quit their jobs, forget that they even have a profession, just to have Brad Pitt's babies, and don't understand how Jennifer Aniston chose work over sex with Brad Pitt.

Its because we idolize them, and i'm not just talking about movie stars, or music idols, its even with our neighbors, friends, classmates, co-workers, we just want them because we think that we're not good enough for them, or that they're way hotter than us, I'm pretty darn sure, that after we get to know more this person that's driving us crazy of desire, you will totally lose whatever feeling or dirty thought you had for them, they will just turn to be someone else, an average person, because in the end, that's what we really are, nothing special, it doesn't matter what we do, or how hot we might think we are.

Toppings

icecream
Originally uploaded by ale_to_rro.

Don't you enjoy walking to a Haguen Daaz or a Basking Robbins, or to whatever icecream brand you like, and see this amazing variety of flavors, where most of the time before you even walk through the door you know exactly what you're going to ask for, but there's always that new flavor that you're going to ask to try, or that other flavor you've never tryed and might do it today.

A relation is like ice cream, you might try several flavors (or even brands, which in this case would be "types") before sticking to the one you like.

For me, its anything with chocolate (although sometimes I have some Praline's 'n cream) , but hey, don't you ever get tired of having the same flavor everytime you go for ice cream? In a relationship, how do you make something which at first could be so exciting like making love in a way that is not monotamous and that won't make you even think of trying a new flavor? You have to spice it up, or on this comparisson, add a topping.

Chocolate ice cream is good, but you know how its even better, add some hot chocolate on top of it, or hot chocolate and whipped cream, or add some sprinkles, or peanutes, or cookies, corn flakes, there has to be hundreds and hundreds of combinations so that you don't always have to eat some plain ol' chocolate ice cream, in a relationship, use a costume, wear a sexy costume or like in chocolate add some chocolate sauce, whipped cream and/or cherries.

Don't do it every day, remember chocolate ice cream by itself is great, so its your partner, if you keep adding or changing stuff remember, the basics are pretty good too...

*Results may vary. Remember eating tons of ice cream will make you gain more than a few extra pounds.

If...

which one honey?
Originally uploaded by ale_to_rro.

Life everyday gives us options, choices to make in order to make it through the day and of course through life. We ponder these options in order to try and predict what could happen and chose the best one, yet somehow even if we take the right choice, we stop and think, "What if I had done this differently?

The infamous, "What If" . Why can't we stop wondering, is it in our nature to doubt our choices? Its okay to think what would had happened if...? I know that one of the choices I made lead me to one of the biggest changes in my life, losing weight. The path to this choice (due to many things involved in it, is more complex than how I am describing it here) lead me to lose a friend, but then again, if it was a real friend then I would have never lost it in the first place, so, an acquaintance, but If those actions and choices (which lead me to lose weight) I had never done them in the first place, I would have never arrived to that path and be where I am today, and how I look today...

What if I had woken up five minutes earlier this morning? What if I hadn't done my bachelors degree here and gone to the states? What if I had studied something else? What if...there are a million what ifs, a thousand alternate universes in which our life could be different, but do we really want to have an alternate life? Would the problems that we have know won't exist there? But what if we in that alternate universe because we don't have that problem we might have something much worse?

Our choices, right or wrong, are the ones which define who we are today and for what do we stand for. These choices are the one that make us grow and make us fall, you don't like who you are today? You don't like the path you've walked? Change the path, change yourself, see who you are, there's always that choice, there's always that what if, we can't erase the past, but the actions we take today will shape our future, wrong or right is our choice.

Red Light

you bastard!
Originally uploaded by ale_to_rro.

When we fall inlove, and we find that special someone in our lives, we think to ourselves that now we have one person who is entirely ours, who will love us for the rest of our lives and who will be faithful to us.

Sometimes in a relationship, this last bit is not completely true, and maybe in a 50 year relationship, we have been with someone else, once, twice or every single day.

Are we able to be faithful forever to our partner?

I'm assuming not, human beings are animals, we do have a conscience, and we use logic and reason, but we're still animals, driven by instinct and by our desires, sometimes we act up on them, sometimes we're strong enough to follow reason and say "stop".

But as any driver should know, you just sometimes drive through a red light, we do follow our desires. We probably think that people like our parents have been faithful their entire lives, but probably they haven't, probably they've had fights we've never known so that we don't change our perception from them, unless its so obvious or constant that one of them (the one being cheated) gets tired of it and files for divorce, or a brake , or the one cheating, falls inlove with the "other" person (just in case, this hasn't and hopefully will never have to happen in my life, i'm just giving and example).

We tell ourselves everyday, we won't tolerate cheating, however, after a long-term relationship or a long marriage, or just too many relationships we learn that everyone does it, at least once, and you know what we do it ouserlves, how can we demand from someone else what we can't give in return? And its not because we don't want to, its because of our animal (or wild) side that leads us to it.

As I stated earlier, there's something that separate us from our fellow mammals, and its our intellect and reason, we should always try and hit the brakes, we should never cross a red light, sometimes we slip and fall, but try to get a hold of it, because in the end, people feelings are on the line, no one likes to hurt anyone, but there's no way tell if you cross that red light, if it will hit someone else.