That's not what I was talking about

Just don't tell them that I told you this. But the place simply is an accident waiting to happen. It's so beautiful yes. But  look at those patches of ground. Are you not worried about the soil? If you plant it that way, how could you stop the soil from being washed away when it rains? When I told someone whether they were not worried about it all they could say for an answer was, No, we're not worried at all. If you actually go down there, you will find that the ground is still relatively stable. It's  not as fragile as it looks.  It's still very strong. 
But that's not what I was talking about. 

The Road to Kapatagan

After I left Upper, I made a detour to the mesmerising village of Kapatagan. This journey was actually about myself; about my never ending quest for that part of myself that I lost a long, long time ago. 

Resplendent tree

Actually, I've been telling anybody who cared to listen that I'd rather live in Upper, where the land is so expansive and neighbors are so far away, they will not be complaining about trees growing so tall they almost touch the sky. In that other place where I grew up, neighbors seem to regard trees as if they were enemies. 

They become very suspicious and cautious when they see a tree growing in your lot untrammelled. It was so infuriating when I heard someone say they were already quite afraid of a tree growing in our lot because it was already so tall, they were afraid it might fall. Then, there were those concerns about electric wires, or trees whose branches already overlapped into the next property. Once, a neighbor actually approached me saying I had to kill that tree growing high near our window because that was a Balete, a habitat for the enkanto. 
So, I said, I wouldn't want to live in that place where people regard trees like enemies. Or something they could cut for firewood. I would like to live in Upper, where I thought I could grow trees as much as I wanted to. I would cover the whole area with dipterocarp, I said. 
But the last time I was in Upper, I came upon somebody I did not know who told me this narra growing high along the roadside might already be interfering with the electric wires and might have to be cut off eventually. I was seething inside. 

Trip to Upper

I won't tell you where Upper is, but it's my beloved rainforest. When I got there, all I could hear was Jimmy saying, look at the clouds, there's nothing there, anymore, look, look! So, I looked up and saw clear, blue sky, the clouds had been carried away somewhere. It was very hot, the grasses had browned, the dust rose to one's nostrils and the wind was curiously stronger than usual. I could see the coconut trees straining to its onslaught. Was it really this windy here before? I asked myself but couldn't remember this kind of wind slamming my face, pushing the leaves to curl and branches of trees to sway. Jimmy said, grabe kahangin! 

When I turned around to the small trees I planted months ago, I noticed the Mindanao Eucalyptus dancing. No, maybe, it was not dancing. It was just trying to accommodate the wind. "The many things that the tree does to battle the forces of nature, an architect once told me. The many things the tree will do to keep its balance. I saw it in the Mindanao Eucalyptus tree dancing. I was afraid it was already straining itself to the limit. Is this already part of the ill effects of the El Niño? I asked myself and decided to look it up as soon as I get back to my life in the virtual world.

When the body shuts down

The first time that it happened, I was writhing in pain, spent the night bent over my stomach, foetal position, or body turned upside down hoping to make it go away.
As soon as the morning came, I managed to bring myself to the internist's clinic, where the internist asked me to go to the radiologist to take a couple of tests. I still remember the soothing hum of the air conditioner, the subdued lighting, the total silence  inside the radiology room, as the radiologist puzzled over what she saw on the computer, asking me over and over to locate the pain. 

"I could not see anything wrong with your body," she said. 

After a while, she asked, "Are you experiencing some kind of stress?"

When I replied, she refused to believe it. "How could you be so stressed in a job that you've been doing over and over again in the last 15 years?"

So, I told her.

Close to midnight last Thursday, after about three hours of waiting, I sat squatting on the floor maybe more than an hour into the press con when the first pain shot up, a signal from space. I made it a point to take a rest that night; and the following day, working up three or four stories at the same time, I knew that I was operating on a low energy level but still believed that my remaining energy could still last me through the end of those stories when I could finally declare a  rest. 

Unfortunately, though, just a sight of one message after the end of the third story, shot my cortisol level up to the roof.  Something must have burst there somewhere because, although, I managed to crawl myself to finish the fourth story, I was no longer myself afterwards.  

The pain is back again.

Afterlife

 

Even in death, my purple basil still remains a thing of beauty. I'm saying this as my herbs are bidding goodbye to me, one after another. 

First, it was the rosemary that said its farewell last week. I barely heard the plant's lament as her leaves, which already looked scraggly and bedraggled, turned yellowish, browned and gradually died. I was doing a difficult story to even mourn. How could I atone for months and years of neglect? 

I've been ruthlessly pruning it for months because its leaves had been growing untrammelled in the wrong side of the pot. I even buried parts of its stem in soil, hoping to generate a new plant in the process. I cut its stems and placed the leaves in the jar of salt. [Ja and Sean did not complain, though. Our salt has become very tasty]. 

I never believed that my rosemary would die in my hands because it has been with me for years. If I ever sensed a plant whimper, I merely ignored it and continued replanting the aloe vera and the snake plants into new pots. So the last pot of rosemary died alone. I used to have so many pots of them the previous years but now they're all gone. 

So I went to the store thinking I could easily replace the plant. But when I asked how much their newly planted rosemary cost, the store told me it was P300 per small pot. Well, I never thought it sells that much. My rosemary, by its sheer size alone, could have sold for more than P1,000!

The last purple basil to die was growing in a pot where I did not want it to grow.  It was a seedling that sprung from a mother plant, the one I bought from a gay entrepreneur selling herbs outside her salon at the height of Covid lockdown. 

I could still feel the breeze blowing my face that day I rode that trisikad along the city's deserted downtown streets bringing the plants with me. That gay seller was not your ordinary beautician.  She had so many other plants that caught my eye, though I only stuck with the purple basil and the Italian oregano, which had smaller leaves than the oregano I already had at home. Both mother plants died long ago.

Sean and Ja were always wary when I brought home some strange plants because they knew these plants would find their way to my dishes which they were required to eat. But these plants had graced our table for a long time now, they had been with me in my countless experiments and reading adventures; and Sean and Ja had somehow adjusted to them. [Actually, not really].

So, as I was saying, the last purple basil, descendant of that mother plant that I bought at the salon, died ahead of the rosemary. But I did not mind its dying mainly because it had been flowering profusely, which meant, its life was already over and it would soon be preparing to die. I also wanted to use the pot where it was growing, my ulterior motive; and besides, I spotted a younger purple basil growing in another pot, so I thought I won't miss it after all.

I tore its roots from the rectangular pot where it tenaciously clung for years. It was so hard tearing it. It took all my strength to uproot it from the soil. When, I finally succeeded, I placed the naked plant in an empty pot and was awestruck by its grace and beauty.  

This must be what sadness--or despair--does to you. 

Self vs Self

Reading remains to be an ultimate source of pleasure to me so, I'm surprised to see here that I've not been writing about it. But why?! 

It's because you're always working, stupid, and only sneak some time to read!  

Hey, hey, hey! You promised not to address me in that tone anymore. Don't break your promise!

What's wrong?

You're self-blaming me again. Take the word stupid.

Oh, am I? Okay, how do I do that?

Write it's because you're always working and only sneak some time to read!

It's because you're always working and only sneak some time to read!

Survivor's Manual

In the old days, fear figured in our survival as a species, the psychologist told us. That's why, in extreme circumstances, fear flashes before us like a warning. We could never rest until we locate the source of that fear, the warning, because it's key to our survival, she said. 

Today, we no longer face those kind of dangers that our ancestors used to face; yet, the amount of stress we had to deal with everyday has grown to unprecedented proportions. Key to surviving the stress of our everyday life is our capacity to savor moments of joy, to locate in our body no longer the source of fear, but the source of pleasure. 

I kept thinking about this as I went back to my room.

Story that I failed to write

Why can't I write it? Is it really that difficult? What's preventing me from writing it? What's the problem with me? Is it the tree? The Mindanao Eucalyptus, also called the Rainbow Tree, which is a beautiful tree? Is it the Balete somewhere outside the camera frame, the tree that started as a branch but grew into a tree? Is there anything wrong with me? Why can't I just roll up my sleeves and write? Oh, God. It will be such an injustice if I continue to fail to write this story. Praying for extra strength.

Baggage

                                                                                                                                          

So who fetched you from the airport? Michelle asked, as soon as we were seated around the table on the 23rd floor, where we were to have our dinner.

Uh. No one, I said. I was already here since the 12^th.
Ah! So, you’ve gone around?
I guess so.
So, you've you been to the New Star?
New Star?
That new hotel. With the new casino, new bars.
Ah, no. No, no, I said, shaking my head, waving my hand. 
I did not go there. I went to the old places, where I used to frequent before. I went there to reconcile myself to the past (paused), to reconcile with myself.  

So that maybe, I could move on. 
The astonishment in her eyes. Move on?! I said to myself. It has been 33 years, c'mon! You mean, you hadn’t moved on yet?  

Perhaps, I had. Perhaps, I hadn't.  But how could I know?!

I never even had the time to think about it.  I came here to look for that girl I lost so many years ago. She was concealed in almost everything I saw. I walked the streets littered with beggars, passed by the stores selling cheap textiles and other odds and ends from China, walked the ugly street of Colon, where once, I used to spend time reading Time magazines at P5 per copy, newspapers at P1 per copy. They used to have newsstands like that, where you could rent a newspaper, even magazines, to read. A testament to the Cebuano's grit? Ingenuity? Entrepreneurial spirit, they used to tell me.
Where else could you rent a Time magazine at P25 per copy? Or the much more expensive National Geographic? It would take a longer time to read.
I used to read until I could already feel the oil on my face, seated on a plastic chair, the electric fan rattling in front of me. The place was so hot and uncomfortable. Why was I so oily when I sweat? Why was I always bothered by the heat and the dust?  Why was my reading interrupted? Who disrupted it? Who stopped it?

Boats in Dumaguete

 

October 2019

Feeling like Rip Van Winkle

As soon as the air cooled, I went out of the hotel and walked towards Osmeña Boulevard, where I took the jeepney that had Santo Niño on its signboard. I asked the driver what route would take me to San Jose and he said, this one, pointing to his manibela. So, after winding down through--was it Sanciangko or P. del Rosario Streets?--the jeepney finally went to my old street and dropped me near the gate. I immediately followed the walk that led to the chapel because that's what had always been on my mind--to find that chapel and see what it looks like now.

They call the walkway leading to it the Paseo Recoletos now, although I could not remember if we ever used that name before. To us, this was simply the way towards the chapel, you would meet so many people here, usually carrying things, baggages, sometimes sacks from the nearby Carbon market. Today, I met this woman hurrying towards somewhere, carrying at least three bags and dragging a child. Another man followed, this time, carrying a--what was that--a sewing machine?! Why do they have to manually carry a sewing machine? A beggar,  covered with soot, lie sleeping on the paseo's floor.  An obnoxious smell of dried urine assailed ones nose.

I was surprised to find the chapel's entry on the ground floor sealed but I could hear church music upstairs. Two opposite stairways led to the second floor. I chose one and heard someone--a priest?!--leading the novena. It's a novena, we're starting the novena, a woman told me. I did not know why she had to explain that to me.  I went down and asked the security guard how long had he been working there because I wanted to know when did they move the chapel to the second floor. But he said he was only working there for four years and it had been that way since he arrived.

I fell silent. I was gone thirty-three years!