Mayhem at Heartbreak Hill

The sink is overflowing with plates and soiled food; the bathroom has become a mess because of the heaps of laundry, the trash can is bursting in the seams. Upstairs, little girls' dolls are strewn grotesquely like a pile of dead people. I am writing this on the bed with sheets unwashed for five days now.

Welcome to mayhem, here in the tiny shack I live in at Heartbreak Hill. No, I do not find order in the chaos nor is it an organized mess. Instead, this is an offshoot of days marked red in calendars, days that meant the nanny is gone for a month for her son's graduation. I count each passing minute that she is away and look forward to her return.

I write this after frying chicken for lunch and ending up with an overcooked slab of meat. The car in the garage is smudged with soot and mud and whatever is left of my Bonsai Garden is about to vanish for good, too.

I long for a break -- a sip of ice-cold beer or a shot of single malt Scotch, perhaps in a bar in Malate, our second home when Manila is flooded. Or in the cobblestone streets of Europe. Perhaps in the pristine white sand beaches of Palawan. Or maybe watching sunset in South Africa. Or just up there in the balcony, sipping coffee freshly brewed in my very own messy kitchen but no doubt the best coffee in the whole of Quezon City.

Now if only the veranda tiles weren't covered with the thickest dust.