Good Times; Full Times

I found out belatedly that today is the cook's birthday. No, it's not what you're thinking. I don't live in a mansion and we don't have a cook, along with a chauffeur, and several parlormaids all waiting on me hand and foot. Although I wouldn't mind having all of the above if they were offered to me in a platter, M is the company cook. We have a cook in the office because we're given free lunch and should we do overtime until 9:00 in the evening, free dinner, too.

M turned 41 today. There's an unspoken rule in the office that at some point during the day, the birthday celebrant will be responsible for feeding 49 hungry people. This is no mean feat; you'd need at least a thousand bucks. For the cook, such money is out of the question, and we felt bad that she had to slink about to avoid enthusiastically called out birthday greetings because these are always followed by the question, "Unsay handa?"

So, the team leaders and I threw her a very-last-minute surprise. We got bihon, 4 gallons of ice cream, and chocolate cake.  I told the accounting clerk to distract her while everyone trooped to the kitchen. She was teary-eyed when everyone burst into a happy birthday song, and for once in company history, everyone didn't attack the food as soon as these were laid out on the table. We all waited til M's blown her candles, sliced her cake, and had her fill of the ice cream. Then, we charged.

A’ travelin We Went

Because he swears he couldn't stand another day of the silent treatment, the hub whisked me off to Cansanto Spring. We took off Saturday morning and made it back home, bone-tired, dusty, and back to being the best of friends, this Sunday afternoon.  

The only damper to the weekend was having to leave the little one at home. The road trip's too long for her and we weren't sure of the accommodations we'd find waiting for us. Moreover, if we take A with us, we'd end up lugging tons of stuff. We'd have to bring milk, vitamins, lotion, diapers, clothes, sterilizer, and many other things that are best brought along during a long trip, not one as short as this. While we were away, I made a point of calling her all the time, to check if she's eaten, taken her nap, and whatnot. I told the yaya to take her to Jollibee and sternly warned my brother not to fight with A over the remote control. When we got back, she reproachfully told me, "Imo man ko biya-an. Ngano wa man ko nimo gikuyug, mama?"

Poem #24

Sex Without Love

sharon olds

 

How do they do it, the ones who make love
without love? Beautiful as dancers,
gliding over each other like ice-skaters
over the ice, fingers hooked
inside each other's bodies, faces
red as steak, wine, wet as the
children at birth whose mothers are going to
give them away. How do they come to the
come to the come to the God come to the
still waters, and not love
the one who came there with them, light
rising slowly as steam off their joined
skin? These are the true religious,
the purists, the pros, the ones who will not
accept a false Messiah, love the
priest instead of the God. They do not
mistake the lover for their own pleasure,
they are like great runners: they know they are alone
with the road surface, the cold, the wind,
the fit of their shoes, their over-all cardio-
vascular health–just factors, like the partner
in the bed, and not the truth, which is the
single body alone in the universe
against its own best time.

 

This Interminable Journey Towards Each Other

*This is the first of a series of love letters.

Doesn't it strike you as odd how very much like archaeologists we are? Every day, we try to chip away at each other's surfaces. We peel a little more of the layers that are as much a part of us as our eyes or hair. We dig up information we would later on sift through, not unlike the way flour is sifted through sieves. Which movie made you cry? Why do you love to cook? What music do you listen to? We feed each other information in spoonfuls: my birthdate, how I got the scar on my left brow, the books I want to read. This is what we do every time we talk to each other. We nourish an inexhaustible hunger to unearth more.

It's not easy, these closely plaited twin journeys of discovery. It's very easy to get lost in the surface, to veer off track because of the regularity of patterns: the constancy of meals, the inconstancy of our fights, the triviality of whispered endearments, the precision with which we mark birthdays, anniversaries, and grudges. But you and I know how painstaking our work is. We tunnel into unplumbed fissures of each other's minds, poking, probing, until we find a glittery vein, half-covered with dust, stone, and secrets. Why do we dig? It is not for the challenge. We dig to understand.

These, then, are what we are to each other: surfaces, patterns, and a series of unearthings. Now you know why we are so much like archaeologists, you and I. Without conscious thought, we have turned our relationship into a science. Every day, we unravel finely knotted ropes of history and self. We learn in clumps; we love in trickles; and every day is a day we spend teaching ourselves memory of each other.

Doesn't it strike you as odd how very much like archaeologists we are?

Phenomenal Woman

And now, another poem, so chosen because today, I'm in serious need of hip hip hurrays and affirmation.

Phenomenal Woman

maya angelou

 

Pretty women wonder where my secret lies.
I'm not cute or built to suit a fashion model's size
But when I start to tell them,
They think I'm telling lies.
I say,
It's in the reach of my arms
The span of my hips,
The stride of my step,
The curl of my lips.
I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.

I walk into a room
Just as cool as you please,
And to a man,
The fellows stand or
Fall down on their knees.
Then they swarm around me,
A hive of honey bees.
I say,
It's the fire in my eyes,
And the flash of my teeth,
The swing in my waist,
And the joy in my feet.
I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.

Men themselves have wondered
What they see in me.
They try so much
But they can't touch
My inner mystery.
When I try to show them
They say they still can't see.
I say,
It's in the arch of my back,
The sun of my smile,
The ride of my breasts,
The grace of my style.
I'm a woman

Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.

Now you understand
Just why my head's not bowed.
I don't shout or jump about
Or have to talk real loud.
When you see me passing
It ought to make you proud.
I say,
It's in the click of my heels,
The bend of my hair,
the palm of my hand,
The need of my care,
'Cause I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.