Wellness Wednesdays: Keep Good Friends

I have several sets of friends. My school friends, my former work friends, my neighbors and special friends who have been an anchor since we got home. Mayo Clini and Carnegie Mello University has this to say about friends -

"Having friends and strong social support is good for your health. Studies have show that those with friends have less stress, fewer cardiovascular problems and stronger immune systems."

Pandemic buddies <3

Since the pandemic isn't over yet, my social life has been limited online. Well, it wasn't so different from when I lived in Singapore since I communicated with my friends back home online. What I missed most was having people around. Whenever I was at the office before I would eat lunch with work friends and sometimes we'd go buy coffee for merienda. Whenever I managed to go home I'd meet friends for dinner or coffee. 

It's been difficult to meet up with friends. We've had to be extra cautious since I'm immunocompromised. I've only had one lakwatsa with friends since we got home. We met up at Sonya's Garden in Tagaytay. That was a really happy day. Despite being cooped up we had so much to talk about. It was a great day and I wish we'd be able to do it again.

Keep good friends, especially those who understand you. They will stand by you. Send you food and help during emergencies. And the best thing about having great friends? They will also pray for you. Keep good friends so you can keep smiling and laughing everyday. 

#BeKind #StaySafe

Because You Can!

Hump day is over and it's Thursday again. I'm only able to follow the days of the week based on Sweetie's office day. I ask him everyday what day it is already. My life used to be controlled by my Google Calendar. I used to have back to back to back meetings. 

I was reading the news today and was really happy to note that we're getting at four medals at the Tokyo Olympics. Wow! Brother Bo Sanchez shared in his vlog Hidilyn Diaz' secret to her success. She put it in her mind that she was going to win. She always gave her best during her training.  

It's truly amazing what you can do when you put your mind to it. Looking back that's how I managed my projects. I always had the end goal in mind and everything I did supported to reach the goal. That's how I also led my team. I'd ask them what they'd like to report by end of the quarter (or year). That makes it easy for them to plan and budget their time for the whole quarter (or year). 

When you have a goal it's important to detail the steps on how you're going to reach it. Most of the tools I use are online, but I still have a handwritten checklist. It's fulfilling to tick off tasks. I still do this now since managing your family in two countries requires program management skills (haha). 

That's the secret to achieving anything - have a clear goal and proper planning prevents poor performance! Go for the gold! 

Day 6 Minimalism Challenge, Write your friends' best qualities. I keep a small circle of really close friends. As you grow older you realize that you don't need a lot of friends. And as you grow older you also experience a lot of stuff about friendship. I trust my besties. I don't talk to them everyday, but they instinctively know when I need them. They know when I'm in one of my moods. They know how to calm me down and what I like and don't like. Our friendship has been through the test of time and that's something I'll never exchange for anything in the world. 

CB///*Yr2/117 #StuckAtHomeDay/Yr2/140 #NewG329 #Home87 #StayHome #BeKind 

Friends Reunion!

We finally got to watch "Friends Reunion" the other day. We didn't have an HBO subscription so had to figure out how it works. Just signed up for a month because I want to try out Disney+ too. Anyway, so we finally watched the "Friends Reunion". Ahhh the nostalgia was really strong. It brought back nights when I'd watch it for laughs. 

I watched the series on and off via TV. I was in my 20s then and it was the time I used to watch movies I'd rent from Video City. I eventually got to watch the whole series when my best friend gave me a DVD set. If I remember correctly it helped me get through a breakup. Friends was really good company and they made me laugh. 

As the creator said, the show was created for that time in our lives when friends become our family. That's probably why I loved watching the show. It was a reflection of who I was at that time. Me and my childhood friends had grown up at that time. We had all graduated from college and had jobs. We'd come together every weekend to hang out much like what Ross, Rachel, Monica, Chandler, Phoebe and Joey would do. 

And much like how Friends ended, we all had to part ways eventually. We all used to live in the same village. Now we live in different parts of the world. I expect, much like the cast of Friends, it's going to take a long time before we all get together again. Hmmm... maybe on my 50th? 

CB///*Yr2/69  #StuckAtHomeDay/Yr2/96 #StayHome #BeKind 

Girlfriends

I've just discovered "Grace and Frankie" on Netflix (just when it launched it's last season!). I got curious one day and just clicked it to watch one episode. It was fun and interesting and after seeing the great chemistry of Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin I searched on YouTube for some of their interviews. I came across one where they did a TedX session, interview-style. It was about celebrating female friendship.

I have a lot of friends, both girls and boys. For girl friends though I'm blessed to have girl friends in different countries and they've been my on-earth guardian angels. What Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin shared in the video is true and I think if all women across the world banded together we can certainly make a huge impact in whatever advocacy we may have.

For my girl friends all around the world. I love you all and hope to see you soon. 

50 Pounds Later...

Finally had time to meet up with my high school buddies today. There's just 5 of us in our barkada and probably around 15 in our extended one. We usually meet-up for Christmas but with work parties and family reunions, it was just hard to bring all of us together.

One of my best buds arrived from China. She arrived on the day I left for Singapore last week and I just arrived in the nick of time for our annual Christmas get-together. Time flies so fast we just realized today that we've been together for more than 23 years now. We were just high school freshmen when fate sat us in class together. We figured that since we were all seated together then we'd be friends (it was that simple before!). So for all four years of high school we ate together everyday at the lunch counter.

We all had varied interests and we practically did not see each other when we went to college (to think we all went to the same university). What kept us together though were some traditions we started off in high school. Here are some:

1. Valentine's day - we weren't popular in high school and we were definitely wall flowers during high school dances, so we made a pact that until we marry we'd celebrate Valentine's day together. We still have two singletons so we continue to celebrate Valentine's together -- usually a day before or after now.

2. Christmas - I don't really know how it started, but for many years now we each create our own wish list and send it to each other and we buy our Christmas gifts based on that and that reassures us that we received gifts we really like during Christmas. And, of course, we always get together for the holidays.

3. Bridal Showers/Baby Showers - we do this for each other depending on who's getting married/having a baby.

4. Summer outings/out of the country trips - we do this every once in awhile and our brood's growing so we try to make sure that we go to places where the kids would enjoy.

5. Always have something the same - it may be pajamas, a blouse, a bag, Christmas decors or whatever catches our fancy. Every year we get something the same. Mababaw lang but it keeps us together.

We don't really see each other that often nor do we keep tabs each other through social networking sites, but our friendship has so far been fun and meaningful through the years.

Love you girls! Here's to xx more pounds! Haha.

Seven Years Ago

I met up with my colleagues from a previous job last night. We met at our old hang-out place, Wendy's Parksquare, where we used to spend only PhP200 every Friday night. I don't know how five of us would get filled up with just PhP200, but we did.  (Remember my blog "Songs fromWendy's"?).

We decided to meet up last night because Jihan's home from Abu Dhabi. We haven't seen her for a couple of years now and not everyone was present for my wedding last Christmas so it was the perfect opportunity to see each other again.

I will not be surprised if Wendy's bans us on our next visit. We were really rowdy. We just couldn't help but laugh about how things were in the past. It was definitely just like old times (without the booze though!) and everybody was just the same save for the fact that half of us were already married and have kids.

Things were so different for me seven years ago and I never really planned what I'd be by this time. The only thing I envisioned back then was the fact that I didn't want to be working in an office by the age of 30 (and I did!). Seven years ago I actually had the time to curl my hair whenever I wanted to (I even had a curling iron in my office drawer!) and I led a routine life. Everything was almost the same week in, week out, save for the gimmicks every once in a while.

I don't have a routine now and I can say that I'm definitely happy in all aspects of my life, but one thing I truly miss are my old friends. Good thing though I have several barkadas who I meet every once in a while. I thought I'd make a post about last night's reunion after sifting through our jurassic photos. It made me a bit emo and nostalgic.

Those were the days :)

 2003. This photo was taken after our annual Christmas party. I had my hair up because we had to wear Filipiniana attire to the party (I think I was part of the party committee bleh) and this photo was taken just before we left for our after-party-party.

 2004. This photo was taken after the annual Christmas party (again). Portia curled my hair because I was unfortunately one of the emcees (errrrr!).

 2005. Some of us had moved on to other companies by 2005 (I was still working for the same company) so we just met up at Market Market.

 2006 (I think). One of our get-togethers. Not really sure if it was in `06.

 2007. Still looking young! This was at Max's Market Market. 

 2009. Didn't have a get-together in 2008 and just managed to meet-up on my wedding day. Some were not able to go due to unavoidable circumstances. This was the team though that managed the coordination for the day. It was the reason I didn't have to hire a wedding coordinator.

2010. Thank you Wendy's for not kicking us out last night! Haha. 

For My Best Friends

Happy birthday J.C.! This day would not have existed without you!

I couldn't help but smile yesterday while talking with my best friend, Anne. I asked her if she it crossed her mind early this year that I would be what I am now. She replied, "Not in my wildest dreams." Of course, being my best friend (and most accessible one), she got the brunt of all my rants and woes. When my schedule wasn't as hectic, we always found time to go to Wendy's and talk. It always took us at least 3 hours to finish a burger and a salad (what are biggie iced teas for? hehehe). So, that's the story behind Songs from Wendy's.

Anne knows how crazily girly I could get too and managed to hold me together a lot of times in the past 2 years. My long-time best friend, Darwin, for almost 2 decades kept that in check and always provided tongue-in-cheek advise, that I'd always end up laughing and that makes me forget why I was lamenting in the first place. Far-away best friend, Tappy, is the out-of-the-box soulful thinker among other things. And the Sweetie-best friend filled up an "opening" that was vacated 12 years ago. And Miguel, believe me, I sometimes mistake that 13-year old to be my guardian angel.

Point is, it takes a lot to keep me together at times. My roller-coaster life demands that I have that many best friends and each of them hold a very special place in my heart. They have seen me through a lot of mishaps and trouble (especially Darwin who's been around since I was a kid). And I thought I'd give them huge, bear hugs this Christmas for always being there for me.

Thank you very much my dearest best friends. I love you guys!

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Additional Christmas Post

This Christmas has been very different from all the other Christmases I've had. I mentioned last night that I missed a lot of stuff - mostly routine - my family (Ate and Kuya) and friends, but the bottomline is, it's not a blue Christmas and here are some more recounts:

Christmas Photos
Christmas Lunch at Good Earth Tea Room
Miguel's Christmas Scavenger Hunt