damil

08/5/11

  

Are you a smoker?

No.

You look like one.

You’re judgmental and stereotypical.

 

 

We would goof about accents. We would laugh to such extent that the other cubicle would slam the door. Vocabulary has never been this hilarious. “You are too funny!” would simply be a surface expression of “Damn, will I ever meet someone who can make me laugh like the way you do now?” One time, we sat on the banig, listened to Inky and Kimay. Sat surrounded by potted plants and a tarragon. The construction workers were in their yellow helmets. They were looking at us from the balkon. We agreed that more than anything, this world is a global village, this culture is raw and beautiful, this toilet bowl is difficult for you. It was breezy that afternoon when you told me about your mother’s voice on the phone. You blushed a bit when I said, “more than anything else, you have an imagination of a little boy.”

 

 

 

 

Do you know that old woman? Why are you smiling at her?

Because she smiled at me first.

Oh, cool.

She really is cool.

She looks funky in those florals and accessories. So glam.

 

We sipped. Paused and talked. We talked about our childhood: cooking while standing on a chair, balay-balay using leaves as money, jetmatic pump baths. We talked about our parents and how they exchanged love letters for 7 years. We talked about how comfortable it is to just sit there and listen to roots music, feel like you are in Latin America and it’s summer and you can just throw your top on the sand because it begins to rain. We could almost sit there and sleep and live on the couch. Years ago, we had tinned tuna overload. We would cry on bed wishing life was better. We cried on each other’s tee.

 

I just can’t bear the thought of a skillful person wasted on a misfit.

I don’t want to. Not for me. I suck at sitting and memorizing.

My wrinkles get deeper. Maybe, I am not happy. But I can’t give up just yet.

Do you want to talk about all these? No?

 

 

We slept. I did. I was not sure if the person next to me did right away. Maybe the next person to me has no gender. Maybe the person right next to me worries about random things: breastfeeding in public, marriages, ancestral houses, puddles that produce sound when you jump into them, too much homemade peanut butter, aching back, the price of clumsiness, the uncertainty of everything about to be chosen , the smell of old local markets and the morning sound of bakeries near the dormitory. Sometimes, it is just good to hear the thunder outside, the soft breath of a person whose dreams and failures have been familiar, the smell of unwashed curtains and that soft innocent feel of another skin on your ankle.

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