The Irony of Life

Just last week, I received an email from my husband who is currently in India, aboard the off-shore vessel where he works. His subject read "Bad News" and I was thinking there was again a problem in the province and that his family had called him. But no. When I opened the email and read it I learned that he lost another good friend.

Melvin Zate, known as Tata to friends and perhaps family, was one of my husband's best friends in his line of work. Tata was said to have died of leukemia while at the duration of his contract. He was confined in a hospital in Singapore and died there. Tata's colleague, who worked in the same vessel with him, emailed my husband who is aboard another off-shore vessel from another company. The news hit my husband bad. I could just imagine how much hurt he was. He must have cried. He has lost a friend.

If the news has been hard for friends to accept, what more for his family, wife and child? If it had happened to my husband, I don't know if I could handle it. My husband said the wife was pregnant.

It is almost funny how life could be so ironic. Just last June or July, Tata and my husband were able to see each other in Singapore and he was just well and happy. It is this reason that my husband could almost not believe that his friend is gone. The irony of life. You can never tell what will happen next.

I told my husband it must have been God's will. Deep inside I am also worried that one day, things like that will happen to him or to me. We are young. We have much ambitions to reach and dreams to follow. But then, we can never.

Only God knows...

My condolences to Tata's family...

I don't know what else to say knowing that it is not easy to accept some facts of life. Sometimes things are not what we want them to be and we have no control over what will become of our lives.

What is It that Makes a Writer a Genuine Writer?

One of the things I usually do at the start and at the end of my day is to search for freelance writing sites or blogs where I can possibly learn more information about the freelance writing market. Although I have been working full time as a writer for an offshore company for some time now and have been doing part time writing work for another, I still feel that my skills are not enough for me to be called a true writer. Call it lack of confidence but deep inside I feel there is more to a writer than just getting employed to write.

My search has led me to several blogs which are really top level; I can't help but commend the writers behind those blogs. From these same blogs, I learned of several high paying markets for freelance writers. I learned, too, some techniques on how to land high paying freelance writing jobs. However, like perhaps many other people who have not yet tapped the best of their potentials, I feel I am not yet ready to venture out to those high paying freelance markets. I feel I still lack the qualities of a genuine writer.

What is it really that makes a writer a genuine writer? I believe that to become a real writer, one must not only have the passion to write. A true writer must be someone who can clearly express his thoughts in words and present those thoughts in a way as to engage the readers. A true writer knows what his readers want and is able to clearly state his points. Otherwise, a writer cannot be called a true writer but just another individual who loves to write and wants to be called a writer but is not really a writer.