For All Intents and Purposes

There are two things that I regretted not doing coming into this program here today: One, I
probably should’ve started preparing about a week ago. That way, I wouldn’t have been awake
until 3 a.m. this morning writing this lecture which some of you wouldn’t even remember—and
two, I should’ve asked your esteemed teacher, Ma’am Maria Valdez, to ban the presence of two
of the brightest and most prolific writers who had joined us here today: Sir Errol and Ma’am
Elizabeth Joy Quijano. That way, my colleagues wouldn’t have to watch me become a mockery
of the literature that they’ve been trying to uphold.
Take note: my resume and credibility is nowhere close to theirs. Believe me, Ma’am Ria
probably wouldn’t want you to know this but I was actually her second choice from fifteen other
essayist that she had in mind.
“But sir—or Kuya—coming second out of fifteen isn’t that bad, right?
Well… Yes, it isn’t, but only if it’s coming from the top and not from the very bottom!
Regardless, I’m here now and everybody else is with me. So, we just have to endure 15 minutes
of my lame, self-depreciating humor, which doesn’t even come close to being funny at all. That,
and a talk on Creative Nonfiction—which I believe, or made to believe, is optional.
Creative Nonfiction, according to Wikipedia, is a genre of writing that uses literary styles and
techniques to create a factually accurate narrative. In short, it is a way of writing that tells a true
story with the flair and linguistic flourish of fiction.
So, instead of saying: ‘My crush and I went to the beach,’ you say…
‘Unexpectedly, My long-time crush invited me to a private resort to spend a lovely afternoon
together. Except for the fine gentleman that thoroughly swept the coast, clearing it of all kinds of
debris and driftwood, and the birds, whose loud chorus joined the cacophony of the sea as its
waves softly settled into the sand in constant intervals, and the hermits that scurried across the
sand as it felt the earth move with each of our varied steps which later synchronized by our
desire to keep each other company, not a single soul was astir. The azure seas and the bright
vermillion glow of the sunset, and the gush of the evening air that brushes against my ears as the
day slowly gave way into the night. He slowly leans in next to me and whispers…’
Do you want me to continue?
Well, I’d love to, but at this point, it’s all fictitious now because none of that is true and hindi
naman kayo cin-rush back ng crush niyo!
Now, that I’m in Law School, I was compelled to learn about plenty of legal maxims and
phrases. One of those—something very powerful and compelling—is the phrase “for all intents
and purposes.”
What does this mean?
It simply conveys absolute or unlimited power.
One time, my brother got into a biking accident. I won’t go further into the details but what
happened was he fell off the bike and he somehow hit his head. Immediately, we already
observed what could’ve been symptoms of severe head injury—nausea, cold sweat, paleness,
sleepiness, and all kinds of ness.
So, my mother decided to admit him to the hospital. And because of the COVID restrictions,
only one could act as the watcher and obviously, it was going to be here. The problem was we
don’t have cash on hand that time and she and my father, who works overseas, only maintains a
dollar account which needed to be withdrawn over the counter.
Being the eldest of us five brothers, it was up to me to do the transaction. So, I drafted the
authorization letter but I found the template that I had time to be severely restricted. It only
allows me to withdraw money and not anything else. What if something else needs to be done?
Then I have to go back to the hospital again, which was about twenty minutes away from the
bank, to get her signature. Back and forth, that would already be twenty minutes and I was yet to
leave the house. So, being a student of the law, I decided to add the phrase—just for good
measure and all.
Fast forward, I was already at the bank and I was sitting down with the manager and he was like
checking all the documents and asking for our IDs and all and deep down I was like… “yeah,
yeah… c’mon. It’s all good. I know my stuff. Everything’s legal, I guarantee it!”
When he was done checking everything he returned the documents to me, including the
authorization letter and he said something along the line of: ‘Please wait a while as we prepare
your money for you.’
I said, ‘Yeah, okay. I’ll just sit tight right here’ and I skimmed through the authorization letter
which I myself drafted mere minutes ago and when I reach the “for all intents and purposes”
part, I was like “Heck, yeah, I’m a genius!” (Believe me, that’s the only time I refer to myself as
a genius in legal matters because most of the time in Law School, I’m a moron with a brain-size
of a pea.)
As I was sitting there, waiting for my mom’s money, a thought slowly made its way into my
mind, like a worm creeping up the back of my skin underneath my clothes.
“For all intents and purposes… for all intents and purposes… for all intents and purposes…”
And my eyes opened as the sudden realization hit me: Holy sh*t! I could probably withdraw far
more than what my mother intends to!
Should I add 500? 1000? 2000? No, 2000 is too noticeable. Let’s just stick to something more
discrete. Maybe 500 would do?
But of course, I didn’t do any of that. But the point is, one single phrases—a group of five words
—gave a document a whole new meaning and exponentially increased its authority and power.
Intent and Purpose is just as important to writing Creative Nonfiction as it is to scrutinizing and
studying law.
But, sir, isn’t Intent and Purpose synonymous or can be even used interchangeably?
Vivan Gornick, an American journalist and essayist, introduces another pair of almost similar
terms in her book “The Situation and The Story: The Art of Personal Narrative”
Based from the title alone, I assume you probably have an idea of what’s coming.
The situation and the story.
How are they different?
Well, to illustrate, assume that there had been a vehicular accident. Terrible accident that
involved an 18-wheeler truck driven by a drunk driver, a multicab doing business as usual, and a
speeding SUV.
The paramedics arrive and immediately asks a responding policeman “what’s the situation”
while the reporter, arriving about ten minutes later asks the same officer, “what’s the story”
If you’ve been the officer, how would you answer the two questions?
Does anybody want to volunteer?
According to Gornick, “every work of literature has both a situation and a story. The situation is
the context or circumstance, sometimes the plot: the story is the emotional experience that
preoccupies the writer: the insight, the wisdom, the thing one has come to say.”
The situation is a huge accident that probably caused tremendous damage to life and property
while the story is why the truck driver was drunk, why the SUV was speeding, and how together
they caused that massive consequence—each person having its own story to tell.
The truck driver have been drinking after he caught his live-in partner with another person. The
SUV’s driver was speeding because he was rushing to get his ailing daughter to the hospital. She
was his only child. Well, the multicab driver was driving all day with a full load of boxes filled
with bread which he unsuccessfully sold to sari-sari stores.
What are the fatalities? Who made the wrong move first? Where are victims now? That’s the
story we want to know.
In the example above, the paramedic and the reporter asked two different questions. Each with a
unique purpose and intention in mind.
The paramedic’s intention was to know about the situation with the purpose to execute the
proper plan to rescue or save the victims. The reporter’s intention was to know the situation with
the purpose of sharing the story to the public.
So, do you still think that purpose and intention are similar?
Just remember that purpose is your bigger, ultimate goal—A clear idea, a plan or a thought while
intention refers to a set of actions, promises, or a kind of behavior which can conclude or reveal a
final result, that is to say, the purpose.
Back when I was starting to write, I didn’t have a clear idea on what these two are all about.
Let me tell you the story about how I became involved in writing.
The year was 2017. My father just came home from Ethiopia where he had spent a year working
as a teacher. It was vacation time for here in the Philippines, too and mom and dad thought that it
was good idea to take the whole family to Cebu. I won’t fill in the rest of the details but I just
want you to know that the trip involved us riding on an airplane. I was already in second year of
college back then and I still haven’t ridden on an airplane just yet, and you know what, it has
always been my dream to become a pilot. So, you could say that the whole affair got me pretty
excited.
Long story short, while I was in that airplane, soaring through the night sky, over the dark Bohol
Sea, I began to visualize the words describing all the minor details of that airplane ride—the
monotonous hum of the jet, every shaking and metallic rattling inside the cabin, the funny
feeling in my gut as the plane descended for landing, and the loud bang emitted by the
undercarriage as it slammed down into the tarmac.
After the trip, when we finally came home here in General Santos City, I took out my notebook
and wrote down every bit of detail that I can remember from that trip. And I was writing blind. I
didn’t know anything about purpose and intent. I didn’t know anything about style, tone, and
voice. All I know was that I needed to write it down, I needed to get it out of my system, and I
needed to do it now. That’s what I thought or that what was I believed—that I was writing blind,
without any purpose or intent.
But then, as I learned, matured, and grew as a writer, I realized that I wasn’t blindly writing at
all!
I was still being guided by intent and purpose but I just didn’t know it!
The intent was to write my experience and my purpose was to keep it as a memento, as a record
of something that I’ve been dreaming of since I was a freshman in high school!
The situation, my first airplane ride. The story, how my emotions rumbled and jumbled with
each stage of the flight.
But it didn’t stop there. Because I haven’t decided to release it out of the public yet, I had the
opportunity to ruminate on it more and then discovered that there’s something more deeper story
into it and when I realized it, a different intent and purpose has arisen from it!
I thought it was a personal experience at first, but the situation was instead the time my whole
family first flew together in one flight! And the story? It was actually how my father had to
spend five years in Africa, far away from us, before he could afford this opportunity for us.
That draft is still resting on my large blue plastic tub/organizer collecting dust together with my
other old manuscripts. If I ever take it out again, who knows how the situation and the story will
change again? Who knows what will be the new intent and purpose I could think of?
When you will write your own essay someday, remember the phrase “for all intents and
purpose.”
No, you will not use it to swindle money from your mother’s bank account.
Always write with purpose and intent and you’ll never lose your situation and your story.
Make sure that each word, each phrase, each sentence, each paragraph is there for a reason. That
is your intent. Every good writer always intends that each of these to appear in the pages. As for
your purpose… Well, it’s for you to find out. The purpose may not be there at the start but will
come out the deeper you get to your story and when you get a hold of it, make sure to hold fast
and never let go.
Do you know how to distinguish a novice writer from an experienced one? Point to any passage
in their work and ask them what is it for? Why is it written there?
If they answer, “I don’t know”, then you have your answer.
I know full well that not everyone here will be career writers. Why? Because I’ve experienced it
myself. To be honest, I’m already two years removed from the last time I got involved in a major
literary event such as this one.
That’s why I want to make it a point that intent and purpose also applies to our daily lives, as
well.
Before I end, let me tell you one last story, a story that is pretty much hits as close to home as
possible.
The year was 2019. For the past two years, I was pretty active in the literary scene I joined
workshops, attended seminars, joined in activities. I started writing in 2017, before that, I had no
training. I wasn’t a member of any school publication or whatsoever. With a little grit and effort,
I somehow managed to get a little foothold in literature. Not too big to be prolific, but just
enough to know a few people and get it on a little gossip here and there.
After qualifying for the last workshop I attended, which happened to be a National workshop, I
decided to go on a hiatus for the rest of 2019 in preparation for 2020, the year which I finally
decided to content my pieces to the Don Carlos Palanca Awards, the biggest literary contest in
the country.
Apparently, my hiatus would get extended because, well, life and reality hit. In December, me
and my girlfriend found out that we were having a kid. Of course, I was happy. But then a few
days later, we discovered that we were actually having KIDS with an S.
I was about to become a father to twins.
Welp, there goes my purpose of becoming a prominent writer. In preparation for real life, I
dropped everything that doesn’t make money. Back then, my intent was to earn enough money
and my purpose was to ensure that my kids would be delivered safely into our world, without
any complications and I knew it was only possible with enough money to be able to afford a
decent hospital.
So, I became a freelance writer and managed to land decent paying gigs. I abandoned creative
writing for something more practical and something that earns the dough. Unlike before, when I
had too much free time in my hands, I could still find myself writing a piece every now and then.
My twins were born in a middle of a global pandemic. Sure, it was difficult. But as I have said,
keep living with intent and purpose and something good will come your way. Sad to say, due to
COVID some of the companies I worked for folded.
There was even a whole month when I went unemployed with two little mouths to feed.
My story allowed me to snatch an award for a big blogging competition last year with a sizeable
cash prize. The same piece also brought me international when it was published in a San
Francisco-based magazine.
Keep living your life with intent, and someday, before you even know it, you will find your
purpose and you will have something to write about.
Good morning and thanks for having me here.