How I nearly lost all the important papers

Sometime in November--no, it was on November 2, to be exact; which was an All Souls Day--I went out of the house in B'la to Mrs. M. to follow up some documents on Pa's property while Eve was on her way back to Davao.  Eve dropped me off at M.'s house, along with all the documents, which were all very important, to talk to Mrs. M.; after which, Mrs. M. also handed me another set of documents, which were also very important, I had a hard time carrying them all in my arms. 
Mrs. M.'s house was shielded by shrubs of gumamela in a garden she made in her yard and the moment I went out of Mrs. M's gate--Mrs. M. was even so generous as to accompany me outside her gate and to hail a SkyLab for me, I thought it was still too early to go home.  It was 2 o'clock in the afternoon, and the hot sun was beating down my cheeks, hotly and fervently, like a long lost lover and I asked the SkyLab to bring me to Bansalan. 

Earlier, upon saying goodbye, Ma'm M said I could hardly find a ride going home to B'la from there, though, I knew I could, if I would only give the Skylab driver the right price quotation; but for some reasons, I did not go straight home. 

But I only went to the public C-R when I got there. Yes, you're right, I merely went to the comfort room to see myself before a huge mirror, then, went off to board another SkyLab on my way home to B'la. 

It was only when I was already riding another SkyLab, and we were already passing by Mrs. M.'s place, that I noticed  I was no longer carrying anything in my arms; no folder, no documents, no nothing! Those were the moments you could never describe the color of my face. I was already moaning and mumbling incomprehensible syllables, when the driver and some passengers, figuring out what was going on, had dropped me off in an area where I could most likely take a ride back to Bansalan.  
Every step of the way along the provincial and national highway that day was fret with unearthly pleadings to God and to the dead. I asked my Pa to please, take care of those documents; to not let it fall in other people's hands (who might not need it anyway) and to return it to me.  I even promised many things to Pa.  I promised to keep my hands off the land he had worked for most of his life, though, I was not interested in it but for the story. 

Something happened to me along that road.  The SkyLab driver, a soft-spoken, gentle old man, did not know the anguish I was going through.  I tried to speak gently to him. I tried to suppress my panic. Those were probably the longest ride I ever endured in my life.  As soon as we reached the public mall, I literally jumped off the SkyLab, stopped breathing as I stepped into the public toilet, and saw--for all the goodness in the world, and all the Saints in Heaven--that the two folders entrusted to me, was just where I left them; a little disarrayed, maybe, someone must have looked through it and found nothing, but they were there. Intact. I promised to light a candle on All Souls Day. 

I went home very wet and tired.  There was a downpour on my way home but I managed to protect the documents with a set of plastic bags I bought from a sarisari store.  

Outpouring

Do you remember when I talked to you that night when it was raining and the rain had soaked my shoes I left outside the door? I discovered it only in the morning when it was time to go and I realized I didn't feel like walking on a wet pair of shoes, so, Eve let me use her pair of black thongs which until now I haven't returned?
No, maybe, my memories got mixed up and I was talking of a different night. 
Maybe, it was not raining that night; but you, as usual, had your old tantrum. You called us names. You said words we never heard at home when we were growing up; words that made us wince with loathing. Ione must have given up on you, she merely sighed a tired sigh.  She had taken cared of you, night and day, and all she got was humiliation. Was that what she was thinking as she closed the door and went outside? 
Ma, I brought her upstairs to rest, ignoring your nagging, Beth-Beth! Asa ka, Beth?! Beth! She was looking very frail. I said, Eve, let Ma sleep here, I will be the one to watch Pa.  
For anyone to watch you at this time meant that one would not sleep a wink until morning. You would ask us for help to sit up and once you're up, you'd ask for help to lie down; and when you're already lying down, you'd say you want to sit up again; and this way over and over all the way till morning. I said, puslan man, Pa, you don't want to sleep, let's have a good talk, Pa. You said, what?! Your eyes glaring. I said, let's talk, and quizzed you about Lola, your father, your sisters. 
"Why do you keep asking me about the dead?" you retorted. 
I did not give up but backed out a bit by asking you about Upper. What the place was like before you came. Who was Ayok, Bagobo. How did he look like. 
"I don't take stock of people in the past," you said. 
I said I'm sick and tired of the city, I want to live in a place like Upper.  I want to plant trees. I want to live in the rainforest (and read Dostoyevsky, Foucault, Annie Proulx). 
You said I can squat there in Upper, there are lots of places to squat. "Squat?!" I asked, wildly amused, feeling betrayed. "Yes, squat," you said. "Many people squat there. You can be like them, squatter." 
"But how will I live?" I asked, feeling you just fenced me off your property.  
"You can plant corn, bananas."
I had that sinking feeling again.
"But I can't live there, Pa," I said, after a while. "I will still stay and work in the city until the boys got to finish college. I will see to it that they finish first, no matter what it takes, before I go and live in a place like Upper."
I heard you pause when you heard this.
It was only much, much later, after I've gone home and taken a bath and was watering my Oregano when I realized what that pause could have meant.
I remember our conversations in the past and I remember that boy who desperately wanted to go to school, but no one else out there had staked it out for him.  Instead, he ended up sending his younger siblings to school. Later, I would hear this boy asking his mother, why? Why? Long after his mother was gone.  He felt betrayed. No one remembered. Or so, he felt. 
You used to say to me, "and that's because I sent you there." "You have your life now because of me." 
You felt abandoned. 
No one come back to return the favor.   
So, when you paused that night, did you finally get it, Pa? Did you finally see a break from the past, did you see a return of a favor, did you see that no one is going to be left behind?

Happy Easter!

I've been holed inside my room for the entire duration of the Lenten break, so, I missed all the observance of the Passion here, which, based on the telltale signs I kept seeing on the streets on the days leading up to it, has been passionately marked by the community where I live. Still, I sat here deeply engrossed in my reading through out the Holy Week until this morning, when I happened to wake up late to find it's a Happy Easter, and I'd like to greet everyone out there, sending this image of the old the old belfry of the church of the Lady of the Abandoned, and its amazing stained glass windows, which have fascinated me since the first time I entered the church's dark cavernous hall alone.