Happy New Year

Thanks to everyone for the support, and here's to a great 2006.

Yesterday, I thought of cancelling all my appointments, but then decided to go about my normal daily routine, which turned out to be a good decision. I hope I can put the issue of the mugging behind me completely, which is what I wanted to happen from the get go anyway. I guess the adrenaline rush from such an experience will give you nightmares, but it will all subside in time.

I would just like to address some of the comments from my mugging post with regards to the race issue. What irks me still, is that some people choose to make it out as a race motivated post, which I still contend is not. As I said, I'm not out to make a political statement directly or indirectly by including "African American from the projects" anywhere in the post, I was just writing about my experience. Obviously not everything I write is to protect the interests of the African American male from the projects, and why should it be? I guess it just demonstrates that I am still not in complete command of the English language, and also quite clueless as to who in fact reads my blog. (Although, I guess ignorance is bliss, because I won't end up writing anything at all for fear of hurting anyone's feelings.)

However, I appreciate that some of those comments came out. Right after am's insensitive comment (at least in the way it was written), some of the race-related comments were very even, which I thank the commentors for doing so, because apparently, they found some language insensitive but they still understood what I meant.

It just pains me that I have to write a rebuttal like this because some of the best people I know are African American and I do my best not to make judgements out of race in my daily life. I don't want to offend anyone, specially when I just wanted to describe just what had happened: a single Filipino immigrant who lives in a poor section of Manhattan populated by poor people, attacked by another poor person. And if I may add, I would be in great denial if I didn't believe that he chose me, and even followed me, because I looked different from everyone else here and looked like I was a new resident. Anyone with no motivation or bad intentions casing the block, will immediately spot me simply because of the way I look. He didn't attack me simply because I was Asian, but given the circumstances, I believe race had something to with it -- and not his race but mine. I live with a racial stigma in this mostly black/hispanic and poor neighborhood, and perhaps that is something to consider the next time you read anything in this blog -- and unlike the African American male from the projects who has advocates everywhere (including ironically me), the only place I know where people will defend my interests is here in this blog. I don't like my current living arrangement since it makes me a target for criminals and other biases, but this is the closest part of town where most of my clients are with rent that I can afford. This is all making me angry, and yet here I am doing my best to understand and accomodate people who think differently. This blog is not that powerful, or important, to further spread the project-living-African American stereotype, but I can still say that I am a gay Filipino male living across 10 massive housing project buildings attacked by an African American teenager without being insensitive to a racial group.

I actually feel quite offended that people would belittle my experience because of the language used. "It's okay to tell us about your sorry mugging experience, but please don't tell us that your mugger was an African American teenager from the projects. People mugged by African American teenagers from the projects are not allowed to tell anyone that they were mugged by an African American teenager from the projects because it is offensive." I'm sorry but that's bullshit. I never indicated that all African American teenagers from the projects are muggers. And you can't erase my experience from memory just because it fit the stereotype you want erased. I was mugged by an African American teenager from the projects, and I'm dealing with it, and so should you.

That being said, I understand now that my blog is catering to a far wider audience than I expected -- which scares the shit out me, but at the same time, it is something I should accept. I was really thinking of a rickey.org reader who would care more for what had happened to me, instead of how I wrote it -- the kind of people who for all intents and purposes was what I needed at the time. Sometimes I get confused because this is a personal blog, and yet, how personal is a blog when it is read by thousands of people, not only from the U.S. but all over the world? The dilema for me always is how to stay true to myself, and tempering that with the needs of the reader. I am only one man, and there are thousands of you. Please don't expect me to be aware of your every particular need. But I try to be a good citizen. (Christians come back! Christians come back! LOL)

I will continue to do my best to keep racial and religious comments to a minimum, without sounding too sterilized, if only because when issues come up, like this one, it is emotionaly draining. One of the reasons why I think my blog is appealing is because it takes us away from those very issues which we are already bombarded with in our daily lives. I've decided to write more personal stories because most of my writing in the past few months have been devoid of any emotion. And yet an incidental mention of race, and people go crazy. But that's life.

I have a positive outlook that every single reader of this blog is a good person and I feel that it is my responsibility to be nice to all of you.

And so enough of this, and on to American Idol and beyond.