dream zone: HS # 5 (finale)

Then in her dream, she saw her husband dreaming.  She saw the ghost of her father-in-law warning her husband not to fall asleep while driving.  She tried to wake him up but found out that she was calling her youngest child instead!  "Enteng, Enteng, my baby!" He was on the narrow hospital bed,  his eyes wide and wet with tears. He was wearing  Johnny's shirt!

She woke up drenched in her own sweat on a narrow hospital bed,  a woman with a copper rod  looking at her while she beat the air with her wand continuously and vigorously, while mumbling what seemed like a litany-  "You have holes all over your body!  You are tattered like an old rag.  You have a lanzones tree growing inside you and it is heavy with fruits as big as "chicos".  Two years are all our Great Father is giving you".

She saw nuns in purple, praying and chanting.  There were hands outstretched over her head, face and body.  She could not breathe.  She faded then woke up to the funeral of her brother she fondly called "Diko".  She pinched herself to establish the reality and concreteness of the images around her.  She wished she were dreaming as she bent to weep.

Two years after...

She woke up one morning just before her husband's "bulik" crowed.  There were ants all over her headboard.  Her pillows were peppered with this family of formicidae trying to organize themselves in a big parade.

"I told you, not where I sleep and eat! You are making me do this!"  She got a big cotton swab of citronella oil and swept it over where the mattress and the headboard met.  She tried to pull the bedsheet to discover the source of this great interest and commotion from these tiny and wingless swarm and as she tugged the linen....
--------------------a------sweet peanut------ butter----------- finger fell!!!!

She let out a scream that dated way back two years ago or two hours ago in her dream.

There was a kingfisher laughing out loud on a bamboo perch and a dog barking.  The rush of the river was audible from her window.  It was cold and the last of the January mornings.  Today is Monday, January 31, 2011. 

Dream zone:HS # 5

She had been sick for several weeks now.  The effects of the drugs that were prescribed to cure her  illness had slowly defeated the last strand of her willpower.

As she lay down without thinking, she had a dream. 

She had two sons, 5 and 6 at that time.  She had a daughter who was 8. and they lived in this unpainted house.  They had 2 native dogs named Tobbie, the older one, and Endak, a dachshund mestiza.

In her dream she dreamed that from a bunch of unripe bananas, one fell off .   It was unnerving to see blood spurting out from the severed banana.  In her dream, she woke up just before her husband's "bulik" crowed.

She wore her sister's polka-dotted dress on the day of her daughter's first communion.  The  mass was held in the Multi Purpose Hall. All the parents lined up to march with their daughters to the altar.  She was almost in tears as she watched her daughter receive the"body of Christ."

When the ceremony was over, the people bustled in front of the altar to take pictures of their daughters kneeling on a pulpit, a rosary clasped in their folded hands like saints in prayer.   It was always a beautiful portrait of every Catholic girl in maybe, her last bid to holiness.

A public announcement calling her name was almost inaudible against the noise and excitement of everyone milling around the hall.  When it finally dawned on her, she almost fainted.

She left her two sons at home.  She was told that her older son had an accident.  One of his fingers was chopped off from his right hand.  A neighbor rushed him to the hospital.

She was dizzy with images of her son in pain and images of blood and  five fingers minus one!  She called out her son's name- "Johnny, Johnny!"  She wailed all the way to the hospital.

Feet scuffled to the emergency room in the town's clinic.  Her bunions did not complain from the shoes that pinched them, she could hardly breathe, and she did not realize that she left her daughter in the multi purpose hall. 

"Johnny, baby!  Mama is here! "  From the narrow hospital bed lay her child with blood stains on his shirt with the name "Johnny" in candy colored letters.  Johnny, baby", she called out... a different face looked up from the small, narrow hospital bed.

It was another nightmare!  She tried to move her toe in an attempt to wake up but the dream rolled out like a reel of film.

to be continued-

HS#3: 4 boxes of buko pies (last part)

Down to my last box of the pie and I started feeling a little guilty for wanting it ALL for myself.
I ate a quarter of the pie and no dramatic brown out happened.  I may not be the Math wizard that I had wished when I was young, but I know my fraction.

3/4 of the pie in the last box was safely kept in the refrigerator.

After 2 long hours in my office with nothing but the pie in my decadent mind, I headed home for the required relaxation.

I decided to share the rest of the pie with my favorite neighbors!  What a good Buddhist and Christian will not think of that?

I texted:  I still have some buko pie to share!  Come on over!

This I did before I reached home.

I picked my best saucers to celebrate the last pieces of heaven.  There is no drink that will do justice to this last operation but cold water.  So I chose my favorite Moroccan tea glasses.  Perfect!  Except that for when I opened the ref...............................the light brown box was not there!  My neighbors were!!!!

I made a silent scream: EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

I must have been punished by the gods and goddesses.

que horror!

HS#3: 4 boxes of buko pies

i have a diabetic husband, a pregnant daughter,  a regular appointment with my doctor, wonderful people living in my neighborhood and 4 boxes of sinfully delicious, and decadently superlative "buko pies".

The 4 heavenly boxes of buko pies arrived with my friends who flew to Manila from Bacolod City.

I waited till the pies got home.  It was 11 pm when its arrival wafted in the air!

I decided that I was not going to sleep without having a taste of it.  I had to. while it was fresh.

My diabetic husband is a reformed glutton. He lost 40 lbs in the last 4 months.  He had to.

I woke my husband that night the buko pies arrived.  If he was going to die, I decided that it be over these buko pies!! 

I opened a box.  It was the most beautiful golden round pie to fill your heart with before you sleep.  The buko filling was exactly the way the meat of young coconut should look, should smell, should taste and should feel in your mouth!  Soft in a gelatinous way, sweet the way nectar is sweet without sugar, hmmmm, hmmmm, mmmmmmmmm!  The crust was always perfect!

My husband and I... we took our first bite.  The lights went out then on again.
My husband and I... we took our second bite.  The lights went out then on again!
WE finished a slice in two bites!

Second slice.
My husband and I took our first second slice bite.  The lights went out then on again.
WE took our second second slice bite and the same thing happened!  "What the..?"

Third slice.
Brown out till our fourth slice.

I gave one quarter of the pie from the first box to the pregnant daughter.

One box went to my doctor whose name means "Divine Grace".  I love her so I gave her one box of heaven!

I gave a quarter of the pie to my wonderful neighbors.  They are, after all my favorite neighbors since they are also my only neighbor.

I ate and ate till I was down to my last box.

to be continued...

(doctor said that I should sleep by 9pm.  it's 9:30 and i don't want her mad at me.  goodnite!)

Not my Sister finale

She thought for a while and considered whether this was something she did not want to know.  After all, she must have known all the siblings she was born into, unless...

a.  this is a sister from an affair of her mother or father
b.  this was a sister she never met because she died when she was a baby
c.  this was a sister from her past life


Once courage was mustered, she stood up, flattened her stomach, expanded her chest, and raised her chin to an angle that added some height to her petite configuration.

She walked nervously to meet her "sister".

As she moved to the direction of the waiting area, she recognized a face- "Tammy, Tammy!" she called.

"There is someone claiming to be our sister - a certain Austen Langoey!"


there she was standing before where the afternoon light burst from the windows and her confusion was evident from the way her pupils dilated and her jaws dropped. 

"Pebbles!"
"Tammy?"

"Yes!"

horrible!

Not my sister

Married but divorced after 4 years, she has a son she adores.  At that time, the only source of stress was perhaps loneliness and a deep pining for him who lived with his Filipino father.  She had him only during weekends.  Otherwise, Pebble's life was peaceful.

She worked in Royal Bank in Canada.

She was efficient and reliable.  Traits that should define the job description fitted her to a T actually.  Her reputation was spotless. 



Her day in the bank would be marked only by regular routines.  The only stress that she probably encountered was coming to work in the winter.

She countersigned checks that were being cashed in by non-depositors of the back. The bank clients were required to present their ID's for authentication.

On that particular day, she had a few clients who were completely unfamiliar for she would sometimes encounter her neighbors or the grocery bagger from time to time.

While the work took its natural course that day, one of her assistants approached her about a client who was cashing in her check but did not bring her proper identification papers.  The said client claimed that she was Pebble's sister and that Pebbles could identify her name written on the check as payee.

Austen Langoey!  She had no sister by that name and there was no need to recall all her siblings.  She was certain she did not know this person.

(time's up - had to give reminders to hubby while writing this)

Finale

The rest of my valuables were still missing. For five days,  I have unpacked and packed for the nth time, each time going through all the pockets and linings of my suitcase.

On my last day in LA, I went through each clothing and pocket once again, wondering how things could just vanish in thin air.  Then, I was interrupted by a text signal from my phone.

It was a chain letter that said "...believe that you will find what you have been looking for..."

I shrugged my shoulders and went back to my chore.  There in front of me was the pouch that vanished in thin air or so I thought. 

continuation of part I: Horror Story 1

I was assigned a room that night, deposited my luggages on the floor, then took a shower.  I took off my earrings and wrist clock, secured them in a pouch then slid the pouch into the inner pocket of my suitcase. Then we settled ourselves in the dining room to catch up on details of life before going to bed. 

I remember finding the house beagle on top of my suitcase sniffing something.  By the way, Snoopy is his pet name.  It was an uneventful night and our trip to the next destination occurred very early in the morning before the sun actually manifested in the sky.

We reached our destination early and while unpacking, I noticed that I was not wearing my earrings and the big watch and not a trace of the pouch either.  The rest of my accessories in a small bag, gone too!  My engagement ring was there.

I was quiet for awhile, not wanting to alarm people and embarrass myself for being "senile".  I began to doubt what I remember doing before I slept, and that was keeping my jewelry in a pouch.  I searched and literally turned my suitcase inside-out and upside-down.  Not a sign of my valuables.

I got a call from my sister-in-law where we stayed that night.  She found some pieces of my valuables under my bed.  Scattered and almost mutilated.

(20 minutes up.  sorry, this is taking long)

Horror Stories: a beginning of a compilation

I would like to write horror stories based on real life but that will be a different agenda from the serious Manual of Operations that I declared I will be starting as a project for 2011.  This will be a completely different take from the usual horror stories that you read about.  It will be a candid account of true to life events of people that I encounter on a day to day basis.  Since I am busy with other things as well, I plan to write something in 20 minutes.

To begin with, Horror Story 1.

This happened in my travel to US last September.  In search of a panacea against mental decay, I went on this trip to stimulate my neuron connections.  I hopped from San Francisco to Los Angeles to the East Coast, then LA,  then San Francisco.

In one of my visits to a relative and friend, a most surreal thing happened.

(to be continued- 20 minutes up because I ate a guava in between)

The NItty Gritty of Learning

The HedCen's Science Expo is about the journey every child undertakes in the avenues of self discovery. I hope that in the process of making a grade, the child sets himself up to transcending perceived limits, and therefore the rung of indolence and procrastination, becomes the ladder to self improvement and a more positive self understanding.

I hope that the parents see the greater reason behind this and use this activity to model positive and productive mentality- that to spare your child from the yoke of labor is an utter underestimation of your child's ability to conquer adversities.  Please take an active interest on your child's activities, help him with time management, provide basic needs and tools, then back out and leave the rest to him.

I have encountered parents who in their zealous ness created a situation more complicated than being parents.  These are some of the ocassions in school where activities such as this expose the "stage parent syndrome" from our otherwise great parents.  Too much control and meddling can be dangerous because it does not allow the child to learn to live using his own skills.    

The teachers or the mentors on the other hand should take a very active role in facilitating not only knowledge but life skills by  paving the way to learning and discovery without the least intention to "just make it happen" leaving the child cold and judged in the middle of this challenge... that a child's failure to meet the highest degree of accomplishment is a question that every teacher should address himself and be accountable for.  I believe that a mediocre teacher produces a likeness of himself among his students while an excellent teacher would want every child to "win"!

A Manual of Operations

A year goes so fast.  2011 is not so new anymore.  On its 11th day, it has grown cobwebs on my ceiling and mildew in the curtains.  My ref is accumulating stuff again after I wiped it clean before the end of last year. 

Such is life.

But I opt to ssssllowww down and not to mind the numbers.  After all, it is but a value assigned to a dreadful waistline after the holidays and a reminder that x +1 is how old we become every after a birthday!

My optic nerve was busted somehow by the meds I took when I was ill so I did not recognize a pregnancy test instrument from a ballpen before I realized that someone was pregnant again! 
so I am now looking closer with better eyesight with the help of stronger spectacles.

The get-togethers will be more often.  My brother visited to spend his holidays with family and is considering a home in the Philippines in the future, where he and his bride of 30 years will spend the rest of their blissful life together.

I will be on a continued sabbatical and aim to write a book - ? about? life? so is it about sex and reproduction?  Nah, I need more experience to write something about those topics, so if a Manual of Operations can be considered a book, then it is.

zooooooomm!!