Losing my notebook

As a young reporter in Cebu city, I did not cover City Hall. That beat used to belong to Sol, who always landed in the banner headline almost everyday. I did not cover Capitol, either. That beat belonged to Michelle, who also used to grab the headlines with Sol. I did not, could not cover the police beat, supposed to be the training ground for young reporters. Instead, I was made to cover the business and economic beat, not because I was a smart ass but because no one my age and fresh from school would dare cover such a beat. In fact, the one covering it was Pops, an octogenarian so aloof I was afraid of him. I treated him like a sage. He always had sums of money, running in the millions, on his head. I knew it because that was always what came out of his mouth when he stood talking with presidents of the Chamber, another scary thing I had to contend with. Pops used to wear a gray beret that covered his balding head. It gave him an air of style and prominence.

Reporters my age used to describe the business beat as difficult, boring, full of economic jargons one can't understand, numbers, figures, charts. How can you make a story out of mere charts and numbers, no narrative, from BIR, from SEC, or from Neda? But my editor taught me how to make the numbers talk. 

Even during those times, I already had the ability to sit straight quietly and listen as somebody explained to me the workings of the Norwegian ship.   Maybe, it was a result of some neglect I might have suffered in childhood because I could sit there for hours listening to a farfetched subject without complaining. Towards the end of the day, I would hurry back to the newsroom to write the story. My business editor would be waiting for it, as if it were a matter of life and death. She would ask as soon as I opened the door, "So, what's your story?" and I would stare at her, mouth open.

So, I'd never open the door again if I was not sure of the story. 

Our newsroom was on the second floor, so even before I could take the stairs, I would be composing the lead  and two supporting paragraphs in my head to give her a ready answer. Sometimes, I would go to the toilet before opening the newsroom door. The toilet was just near the newsroom door. You can write your lead and two supporting paragraphs in the toilet. 

I was still a dreamy-eyed and clumsy young reporter then. I never actually fully understood what was going on with my life. 

One afternoon, after spending long hours with Norwegian engineers piloting a shipping project in the city, I was already three steps to the newsroom door when I realised I no longer had my notes with me. I panicked. Where could have I left my notebook? Did I drop it in the jeepney? I was about to go back to chase the jeepney when I realised--how could I do that?! There were lots of jeepneys plying the city. How would I know which was the one I was riding? 

So, right then and there, I tried to recall the story. I loved those Norwegians so much. Just like me, they'd be easily dismissed as boring and they never spoke English that fast. They spoke English slowly, as unsure as I was. I could ask them over and over again about the basic concept of their machine and they'd never tire explaining it to me. So, more or less, I already had the story in my head. I can even approximate a quotation, knowing their Norwegian English well. Yes, it was really, really painful to retrieve jottings from a lost notebook in your own mind. It was hell. The story made it to the business page's banner headline the following day. But from then on, I really made sure not to lose my notebook again. 

 

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.

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!

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?

Dear Old Self

So, do you still remember going into the midnight sale at the Metro? No, no, not even the Metro but that rustic department store somewhere near Gaisano South of Colon? Yes,Fairmart. Where we used to walk through the thickening crowds swarming the store and pushing their way to the rummage bins, where the sales staff used to throw away those items as thick as they’re dusty and smelling of old corners for having stayed on the display shelves for years.
What were you thinking then, as you waded through the swelling, palpitating crowd, finding your way around the thick forest of clothes, inch by inch, nudging those who shoved and elbowed you, shoving and elbowing in return?
What decadence, you used to grumble, your eyes popping at the price tags of a coveted piece of blouse or underwear which could transform you into another you, affording you a chance to dream, “What decadence!” you exclaimed, mimicking that Russian KGB in a popular American situation comedy you used to watch in Honey’s room inside the Tsa Elim Dormitory.
So, what were you thinking then? Did you think you can change yourself from being a poor girl from a land across the sea now in a big city to get a college education? Did you think you can change the world by changing the way you looked?
You tried a dress and saw how it suited your young and scrawny body, how it flattered your skin, your mind a whirl of emotion as you looked at that face in the mirror. Was it you? Who’s that girl? You asked, turning, staring, wanting to take all, spending a day’s worth of food allowance to buy a dream and feed your burning delusions.
I didn’t know what happened after that. I have counted the years and surveyed this particular time, and found out how brief it was compared to the great avalanche that eventually followed and pulled you out of there and brought you to me.
I wish you had been more circumspect. I wish I had warned you but I was equally careless! I wish you had tarried in one of those magazine shops somewhere near the Ultra Vistarama and the Oriente where you can read Time and Newsweek for only P5 or so, or a newspaper for P2 or so; or ogle at Itzhak Bentov’s “Stalking the Wild Pendulum,” or Carl Sagan’s “Broca’s Brain” in another bookstore, instead of shoving your way into that stupid midnight sale, flirting with your own ego!