i am terribly past deadline but not quite shaken. Alfredo will understand. Recalling the pasts is as difficult as a kindergarten trying to learn the linear equation. It is to me.
The next day, i surrendered to Keith the Book (The Tender Bar) because he "expressed" interest to read and "and maybe also do some writing" and join the workshops. (Oh, yes.)
Late again for office, but has managed to find some time for facebook, i came across Blesela's message, a very long thread of our private, personal chitchats. the final entry was: "Shyet, napatay si Richard!!!" which was totally out of topic because 1.) the thread wasn't about him; 2) the thread was about manila people 3) the thread has mutated into a discussion on zynga-facebook rift and the horrors it will bring to facebook gamers like Blesela. So Richard died -- rich--WHO? Somebody we knew. Not our friend, but somebody we knew. and somebody of our age range.
Last April 12, my friend, and fellow graduate student Cornelio (Kune) also died. he had congenital heart problem and apparently died from heart attack. He had been suffering from "lain pamatyag" few days back but i don't think he really was expecting he'd die from "lain pamatyag". But he did and it shocked me. (just like somebody actually dies from pasmo...pasmism)
(I didn't fo to his wake. I don't like going to wakes. I even avoid attending the wakes and funerals of my relatives.)
It';s sad, how, it seems, that every month a friend, an acquaintance, an ex-friend, fellow varsity player, a schoolmate, dies as if 30-ish has become the average life span of a Filipino.
30 is the new 70. now that's scary.
(do i look like i'm 70??!)
In late March of this year, a fellow UP schoolmate died from cardiac arrest as a result of lymphoma. more than a year ago, we also thought my sister was gonna die from a rare, malignant and aggressive breast tumor, Phyllodes. But she probably is a "masamang damo" and everything turned out fine as the tumor hasn't yet metastasized. Just as her daughter turned 4 months, she had her mastectomy.
So this May, Richard, the polio-tic drummer of some college band i liked, well, we liked, my friends and I, died of heart attack. he's not so much older than i am, also 30-ish. I remember their guitarist, Scott, also died in a motorcycle accident some years ago. Then there was Benjie, not their band member but some close friend of theirs (who became one of my friend's friend in the university) who also died from a vehicular accident. Some more years back, in the late 90's another one of their friend (or maybe he was just their acquaintance, who knows?), Sym, died from massive brain hemorrhage after he crashed his head on the pavement when their motorcycle collided with the center island. They were just coming home from a gig in a fiesta somewhere, lacking sleep and apparently still groggy from alcohol. They didn't know they were overspeeding and life stopped when their bikes crashed.
i was excited to come to office and write about the rest of my drafts after the writing frenzy last night but apparently this death thing changed it all and i can't concentrate anymore. Over the election vacation i dug through my old journals (found tickets of a river maya concert i attended in 1995, nostalgia galore), brought the more recent notebooks/journals back to Jaro hoping that i, in the mighty glory and power of the journals i'm beholden to, will be given enough memory to write. But no, richard died and all the 90s memories came rushing in and i have no material! gaddamit, no material to write on. so the drafts, the writing flow had to be revised because my brain wants to recall things from another decade.
(who was i with in my first Sigabong..clash what??--1994...noreen? WHat concert did i first meet you Bles? Last concert i went to in UPV grounds...what Sigabong was rained on--was it even sigabong or some other band. ANd why was i not able to attend the The Youth concert? something whent wrong with Dodong Cruz's strings in the middle of the song, supernova. Who came first, eraserheads in west of rivermaya in San ag? GRRRRR. pi-ang pa si kitoy sang nag tambay kami upod ni mokie antes sang what fucking concert or battle of da band was that again???)
I will get my materials this weekend, from Bles, apparently who, without telling me, burned all the letters from her correspondents during our zinester days. how are we -- am i -- supposed to write about it now then? because i don;t want to write fiction. No. No fiction.
(my sister said: mabait na kabayo, madaling mamatay." that's why she survived, because she's not a kabayo -- i mean, she is not mabait.)
and meanwhile, recalling my aunt's house form the 2005 visit, there seems to be a big wad of envelopes in one corner of her house. and those letters were mine. and now they are probably gone also. she probably threw them out. after all, only the crazies like me and Blesela keep them yellowing decade-old letters, the concert tickets and the posters we stole weeks before the gig actually began. so now how am i gonna know who i wrote to being reji tattletale?
projects...projects.
this weekend. will start one. and finish two.
