Rural energy

Before the age of the internet and social media consumed my life, I grew up in the comfortable confines of Dulag, a rural community in Butuan, where I schooled from grade school to third-year high school. That was before I moved to Leyte to finish my secondary education and pursue my degree and career path.

I remember my early life as I relish this peaceful condition at Brgy. Tagbayani, Sison, Surigao del Norte today. We will spend the night here following the training we conducted earlier. We finished the activity before 3 PM. Now, all there is left to process, which is a reward to me in the free form, is this tranquility and the mountain view surrounding this simple community.

My heart is warmest when I come to the rural for work or even intentional escape. Art, a good friend, and I used to revisit Dulag and similar places that reward the same sense of not being connected to the whole world but exclusive and one with the trees and the friendly breeze.

Brgy. Tagbayani gives off the same energy. And this writing is the product of missing the life I used to enjoy, though rarely acknowledged while growing up and developing my curiosities.

I reported to the office early this week after spending the previous one in Dinagat Islands. And the shift to default office energy was stark and regretted. I immediately longed for fieldwork. Good thing that today’s activity here pushed through. And the same wishing for a simple life and not wanting any more from the competitive arena in the cities resurfaced.

It is all in the head. My circumstance now is the opposite of what I used to have at Dulag with my then-complete family.

Field works are my temporary escapes from the chaos and wanting-more culture programmed by the big world and its dysfunctional systems.