7/30/2004: I feel like Jerry Maguire now...

...singing in his car the Free Falling song (...now I’m free...free fallin’…). All he ever did was be true to himself, didn’t know how it’d turn out, how it’ll be accepted, his attempt to change the culture of his company. Now he’s been shoved off the building, and is in a mightily long free fall. In a way he feels liberated, because anything is possible now – perhaps nothing, perhaps a company of his own reflective of his new philosophy -- and the devotion of a pretty lady telling him he had her at hello.

7/18/2004: Will you jump off a plane...

...if you knew for certain you were going to fall flat and hard on the ground? Surely you wouldn't. You would rather just know that one of 2 things can happen: (1) you will fall flat and hard on the ground, very fatal; or (2) the parachute will launch, cooperate, and give you a safe landing, very fortunate.

Either way it is going to give you about 60 seconds of amazing free fall, exhilirating views and a liberating sense of release. Release! That's what we need most of all. And so you would choose to jump into the sky's infinite unknown, because whether you end up falling fatally hard or flying like you had your own wings, either way you have learned to embrace the truth.

7/13/2004: Magno was driven to the west..

...in search of greener pastures, but what he found was untilled soil which he would toil and make green under the scorching California sun, which would break his back, but not his spirit. What gives him respite from his daily realities is the promise of love from a girl named Clarabelle, a tall blonde girl he has not met but found only through a lonely hearts magazine. Since then he has pined for her and written to her Cyrano de Bergerac style through his college educated friend’s literary generosity. But Clarabelle would turn out to be nothing more than a leech, playing upon Magno’s naivete and kindness, taking as much as she could take without giving Magno the love he had been hoping for. The Romance of Magno Rubio is as much about Magno’s romantic illusions with Clarabelle as it is about the blind flirtations that dreamy Filipinos have with America. Trusting in the honesty of love, of supposed friendship, and a shared history – Magno Rubio “Fili-Pinoy, 4 feet 6 inches tall, dark as a coconut ball” finds that he is given nothing, nay even a paltry tip. [The Romance of Magno Rubio is a play based on Carlos Bulosan’s short story. The show’s last run was July 11, 2004 at the Victory Garden’s Theater in Chicago.]

7/11/2004: What does it profit a Spiderman...

...if he saves the whole world but loses his love? Even a superhero needs to be sustained by the love of his life. To carry the weight of the world by yourself, and not have anyone to at least share in your frustrations over the evil, hardships, and the demands of having to always play invincible superhero to the world that has come to always expect it from you, even though sometimes they could turn against you -- to have to deal with that and not have your passionate Mary Jane by your side, your spidey suit becomes a choking, limiting burden. While we know our superhero can always be counted on to save the day, every day the superhero asks himself: ‘Who will save me from myself?’.

7/7/2004: New York is like...

...a 3-day love affair that will forever haunt your fondest memories. In that brief affair, you learn so much about her and yet not be able to truly know her in full. In the little that you see you are helplessly hooked -- and are infinitely intrigued to see so much more, to wander in her every nook, to wonder about her uniqueness, her every move, her every mood. The affair has ended and yet your thoughts always find itself in her. You want to go back. You don’t want to leave. You want to stay.

New York is a slippery slope from which you fall and fall deep, an affliction from which you never recover, an affair to endlessly relive and remember…