Here Be Depression.

So what happens is this.

I collect depressing thoughts and moments. I stack them up neatly. I put them aside. Once a month, I reach for this pile, and I dump it onto my laptop.

After a lot of editing, I decide it goes to the blogger.

A very simple process.

***

I AM NOT FILIPINO.

No, this is NOT hypocrisy.

This is a fact. FILIPINO does not tell you what country I am from, or what my nationality is. It does not tell you what culture I was raised in, or where my patriotism lies.

What is Filipino in this place?

It is a LABEL. A name used to identify a person who is underpaid, overworked, used and abused. A person NO ONE would pay thousands of riyals to teach them anything. A person NO ONE listens to, who has no influence on anyone. A person who talks funny, who is only capable of doing your dirty work, who is short, straight-haired, who takes all kinds of shit from anyone and everyone.

A person you can make fun of.

A person you can kick to the curb, because no one cares enough about them to defend them or pick them up.

A person who, in fact, cannot defend themselves.

A person who is so stupid, they can't even manage to clean the kitchen the way you asked them to.

A non-entity.

So, my friends. NO. I am NOT Filipino.

***

I AM NOT BI-POLAR. And I am not Manic Depressive.

***

" AIDS. Homosexual. Gay. Lesbian. You think these are names that tell you who a person sleeps with, but they don't tell you that. No. Like all labels, they tell you one thing and one thing only. Where does an individual so identified fit into the food chain, the pecking order. Not ideology or sexual taste, but something much simpler: CLOUT. Not who I fuck or who fucks me, but who will come to the phone when I call, who owes me favors. This is what a label refers to.

Now, to someone who doesn't understand this, a homosexual is what I am because I have sex with men. But really this is wrong. A homosexual is somebody who, in 15 years of trying, cannot get a pissant anti-discrimination bill through the city council. A homosexual is somebody who knows nobody and whom nobody knows. Who has zero clout.

Does this sound like me, Henry?"

- Ray Cohn, Angels in America