Goodbye to a Friend

Dear insansapinas,

He may have died depressed, angry and sick.


That was his third or fourth stroke. This year, I was surprised that after several years of marriage he and the wife separated.


I know that the marriage was not stable years after they suffered financial hardship that they were forced to dispose all their properties except for the house and lot in our village.


HE SAVED me from possible bleeding to death when I had just moved to the village.I was aloof and did not bother to meet the neighbors. They were trying to find out if I was married, a single mom or a kept woman (perhaps). There were no boys in the household except for my tsikiting gubat. That was why. Gossip transcends economic/social status and is the favorite past time of neighbors--idle or not.


I had a small garden in my front yard where I put up a trellis for my favorite veggie--the ampalaya. That day, I was feeling stressed while working on some projects that I called in sick from my regular 9-5 job. I was talking to the ampalaya why they are " bansot". Yes Virginia, I talk to dead people, veggies and flowers. When I was in an accounting firm, I talked to the wall of the office especially during audit season.


I was standing on a small chair when I miscalculated my balance. Besides the soil was soft. The chair tumbled down the ground and I was sent " flying" towards our grill fence. My palm was ripped open and an artery must have been cut. I was bleeding profusely. I was alone since the kids were in the school and the nannies were with them. It was after 2 o clock and the village was quiet. Some SAHMs must be taking naps; others were in their offices. Children were in schools.


I tied my upper arm to slow down the flow of the blood from the heart. I was a bleeder. Then I took some cigarettes ( my former help was smoking and forgot a few sticks), removed the paper and covered my wound with the tobacco. My mother taught me this first aid to prevent infection and stop the bleeding. But I need to have stitches in my palm and painkiller prescriptions.


At that time, landline telephone is as scarce as the teeth of a crow especially in our place where most of the lines were already allotted to the businesses and an exclusive village whose owner funded the road development.


All along, my friend was watching me. He was reluctant to offer help because he knew that I don't talk to "strangers". But when he saw blood in my clothes, he grabbed the key of his sportscar and drove me to the nearest doctor. No talks, no interviews. Just plain thank you.


We became friends after that incident. He came to the US to try his luck. He was a seaman. But he could not find a job. When I migrated to the US, he went home to the Philippines to reconcile with the wife.


His stroke must have affected his brain that everyone was complaining that he became grumpy and irrational.


When I came home last year, he talked to me over the phone and he seemed was normal. But he whined and I sensed that anger consumed him. It must be his pride for being a stay-at-home-husband while the wife brings home the bacon. He was used to being a good provider and he felt that he was already inutile.


When my tsikiting gubat helped him in his computer, he intimated that he had a lot of respect to me for being able to carry my cross without too much whining.


Kung alam lang niyang nilagyan ko ng maliit na wheels sa likod. Woops.


To my friend, Rest in peace.


Pinaysaamerika