1991 (work in progress)

2: Tone

Two houses down I see Nelson's car turn to our garage. Weaving about in the turmoil of the town park. I pocketed my lucky throwing stones; their serendipitous way of landing always within the drawn box has yet to be challenged in any of our Piko games. Vaulting the column of colorful half dug-in tires just when a tremor made me lose my footing and slipping on the mudded sidewalk that borders it. I could feel my friends snickering as I picked myself up. I turned trying my best to be as menacing and nonchalant as possible under the circumstances; decorum and early adolescence never mix. There they stood under the venerating protection of our century tree, the center of our town; its crown dipped in blazing emerald leaves only did I see the immensity of its castle in discord. Within its wall, a surreal rebellion stirs; the unrecognizable voices float over the people that walk aloof, the police shout on handheld speakers of indistinct directions, the clang of crude pre-owned Japanese engines knocking inside the eccentric frames of jeepneys. The unkempt grass battling for supremacy with the pavement, trash and loiters. The playground even with its faded rainbow paint still radiates against the drizzling sky. 

I raise my fist pressing it to my checks then pointing at them. I dashed across the paved road making splashes on the paddles of water.  On the intersection of Manga and Langka Street just beside the park a corner house built with reinforced hardwood, toil and gratitude belong to Mang Taru, my Father's right hand and longest friend. This late in the afternoon his probably in the warehouse watching over the cargo being picked up. If my father was Panday he was the closest to Bugoy the sidekick or the Hermit-adviser who no one seems to remember the name to then again he can be both; lived through the ancients yet could still throw a slapstick joke once in a while.

I remember it was when I was punished, grounded to not leave the house for sullying our water-cooled air conditioner, to say the least. To skip most of the watery details whenever my parents would miss me they'll just turn the water-cooled fan on and my memory would circulate within the livingroom. The Proustian effect! Father forbid me to leave the house unless school or church for a whole month which was lenient compared to what Mother's sibat did, no chair gave comfort when I sat down for almost two days.

I was probably the only kid that eagerly woke up to go to the school that time not for the friends since your classmates are also your neighbors in this small town especially not the learning father's books already though me before the lesson was even being conceived in a lesson plan but do not misquote me I adore some of my teachers. I awaited school because of the opportunity to sneak out. That day after school I always have about two hours after four in the afternoon to enjoy freedom before my parents come home. That day I went straight to meet with Dodong one of my classmates staying two houses down. 

It's always a joy to look around Dodong's backyard for his father is the prominent mechanic of our town. There is always something dying or being revived; decaying truck, rotting handheld cutters, blackening rotors being gutted for parts. The legend goes that if Manong N. brings in a jeepney to be fixed today the broken refrigerator of Manoy G. brought in the previous week will work tomorrow, Manang A. brings in her Television the day after that Manong N's jeepney drives out soon after. A constant flow of rust and copper could not create a simpler beauty of literature about the constant flow of life and death. It would have made Dr. Frankenstein's home if he was born out of poverty, in the tropics with very little means for gothic romantic science but gives way to pragmatic diesel technology, so what happens when you create a life with hundreds of spark plugs instead of a thousand bolt lighting? You get Dodong and his acquiesce to turn pencil crewing to a craft.