Fragments of the Quiet Mind

There are stories we shouldn't have to write. Only silences we’re forced to translate. I read about a fire today.  A mother. Three children. A house that turned into a question no one knows how to answer. The most dangerous thing about depression is not how loud it screams, but how politely it knocks. It comes dressed like fatigue. Like waiting. Like trying one more time.  Until one day, it forgets to knock—and burns the door down instead. No one chooses to become unrecognizable. But pain does that. Not in sudden, cinematic moments—but in hours no one sees. When a woman looks in the mirror and no longer sees a mother, a daughter, a wife—just a thing that hurts too loudly to exist quietly. And what do we do? We wait. We say, “Let’s talk tomorrow.” We say, “Kaya mo ‘yan.” We say, “Magdasal ka.” And then we look away. We build systems that take reports but not responsibility. We believe in due process but not in urgency. We leave people at the edge and call it patie...