Good, Old Friends

Yesterday I was riding on a Victory Liner bus. Once again I traveled for more or less eight grueling hours. For sure, during those times, my fellow passengers were as harried as I was. At the bus station, a lot of people were waiting for available buses to board at. As early as New Year’s eve almost all trips were fully booked. Good thing that my Tita Loren has friends who're bus drivers.

So I was on the road last night with the usual heavy heart and fatter body that I always carry back home to Manila from Santiago city. I have no choice but to face and go back to the hanging responsibilities left here in the Metro. Despite the almost more than two weeks of rest, my body still wants to relax and delight in the goodness of the province, with the niceties that the parents are always ready to give albeit the looming financial crisis that they often complain about.

While my relationship with Metro Manila is purely academic and professional, my love for Isabela is quite personal and, yeah, quite complicated. It is, I must admit, a hit or miss thing. The province never fails me with its mysteries and surprises, with its slow progress and decrepitude, with the funny and shameless tarpaulins of politicians sprawled straight across the parochial church, with the grimy and wet market at the heart of Santiago city. On the other hand,who can’t find pleasure in seeing former classmates and familiar faces in line for holy communion during Sunday mass, in juicy scuttlebutts about friends and former schoolmates as main topics of phone conversations and online chatting, in attending debuts without any formal invitation from the main celebrator, in going home at seven in the morning together with friends who, like you, are either feeling groggy due to lack of sleep, or feeling tipsy and smelling like a whole bottle of Generoso brandy because of a long night of booze and talk.

Yesterday I was with two young friends who are now in fourth year high school. The fancy and sudden meet up happened because of the exhilaration I felt upon learning that they just passed the DLSU admission exam. On my part it brought up a lot of memories, and even ushered me back to a whole region of regrets and failures when I was in high school. I unfortunately flunked the exams for that school, which I honestly expected since I was totally poor in Math. It even made me remember the time when Mama and I first learned about the results online. Honestly I was really shameful of not passing DLSU, since everyone then had high hopes that I’d make it. But I did not, sadly.

Which all the more makes me prouder of my long-time friends.

Paula passed for ECE and Noel for Computer Science. Though I wonder what made these two aspiring writers turn to courses like these? However, in spite of passing DLSU and being extremely happy about it, I sensed in them the same giddiness and anticipation and frustration that I had had before over passing the UPCAT. In this time of psychological torment and pressure on what school would they end up belonging to after high school graduation, I did not care to find time to fool around with their hopes and even dampen their emotions. Now that they had already taken the UPCAT and are just impatiently waiting for the results, all I advised them was to pray harder and focus on the requirements and responsibilities that they’re liable for as of the moment. Wracking your nerves like there’s no tomorrow would just take the sanity out of you, kids!

Whenever we’re texting and chatting, these kids always say they miss me. And honestly I miss them, too! Last night I was touched by their subtle gestures of affection, by the cute and shocking stories that they told me, by the reminiscent tone in their voices, by their attempt of paying for my tricycle fare, by their company on my walk to home, by Paula’s subtle yet warm hugs every time I kidded her about getting fat and girlish with the dress she wore on a family picture posted over Friendster , by Noel’s casual yet heartfelt high-five as we parted ways. I missed those simple gesticulations of friends whom I was not able to meet up with in almost a year.

Though we’ve been texting and chatting with one another constantly, there was still that different surge at the heart when I heard the lilts in their voices, the awe in their eyes, and the uncontrollable laughter upon meeting face to face. Indeed, albeit the more mature thinking and the various fields of experiences that now gap us from one another, they for me still remain the Paula and Noel whom I know of. These kids who never fail to sweetly call me Kuya Oj. These kids who never waver in trusting and believing in my talent in writing and speaking. These kids who never fail to update me about the latest and hottest gossips and developments in our school from the day I graduated. These kids who never stop sharing their thoughts and experiences in love, life, and even sex.

Oh, these kids who never fail to amaze me in various ways!