Book of Joylin: Looking Back

Monday, October 20, 2008

5:52 AM train, Cubao MRT Station. I arrive at work 6:48 AM. No one mentions having seen me on Trip Na Trip last Friday; this is a good thing because it conserves my private life outside my workplace.

I file annual leave for October 30 and 31.

I leave work at 4:30 PM with Agnes Caballa, who swings me by an antique dealer’s house in Quezon City before dropping me off at GMA/Kamuning MRT Station.

I take the 5:50 PM and then a tricycle. Everyone is home: My son Chito, who works as a licensed mortician at Sanctuarium; my daughter-in-law Ivy; and their two children Angelique Pearl, 13, and Aubrey Rose, 9, who are grade-schoolers at Saint Paul Pasig. Aubrey attended a gift course earlier this afternoon and proudly tells me that she chose Dance.

At 7:00 PM, someone from Sanctuarium calls up Chito and asks him to come back to his office. It’s Sanctuarium’s second anniversary and the entire staff are celebrating. I send a text greeting to Eugene Cheng, Sanctuarium’s Vice-President for Operations.

I sleep from 9:35 PM - 4:00 AM, but I recall waking up briefly at 3:30 AM.

Nonon Padilla sends me a text message informing me that he has not yet cast my full-length play “Saan Ba Tayo Ihahatid Ng Disyembre?” which PETA is world-premiering in February 2009.

Ona Lara Unico of Bayan Productions’ “Trip na Trip” sends me a text message confirming our digital shoot on Saturday, when Gerard Elvina and I are scheduled to do a remote scanning of the Umalis’ ancestral house in Tiaong, Quezon via flashdrive photographs on their studio LCD.

I have a dream:

“A Gathering”

I am in a restaurant in Rome . I meet a Jesuit priest and two female classmates from the time I was enrolled in an M.A. degree course in Clinical Psychology. We order food and eat. There is not enough rice for me, and so I order more. Afterwards there is much discussion about how much each one of us must pay, including the tip for the waitress. My companions leave me. I move to the far end of the long table where two friends from another past episode in my life are seated. They, too, eventually leave me. I feel rejected.

I look at a trash can that has the word “TAZA” written on it. It stands in front of a tall fence beyond which there is a house. A crude sign reads: “NO TRESPASSING”. It is possible, I surmise, that tourists often attempt to climb over this fence.

A waitress brings me an ashtray and matches. I light up a cigarette. I think of Jessica Zafra and the manuscript of her novel set in Italy . She must have taken down voluminous notes to record all of her observations. I suddenly wonder if, were I a young boy, I would survive working here, perhaps as a grocer’s boy. Then I wonder whether I would also be unhappy.

Later, for some reason, I meet with my Psychology circle again. Everyone is distant except for Pat Fermin who tells me, “I defended you.” She then asks me about Halloween rituals. One of the female professors becomes interested and joins our conversation. I tell Pat, “Face the window that looks out to the east and light yellow incense the minute you see the sun rising.” I comment on how the October 17-18 debacle that someone predicted never actually happened and how disappointing that was.

Next, I am all alone again, walking through a forest on soft, damp grass. I begin dreaming lucidly. I am enjoying astrally traveling in Rome . I activate my shamanic senses. I pick up handfuls of grass and try to take in their scent. I can actually feel the grass in my hands, but I can’t smell it.

There are other people ahead of me, and two big, black men behind me. It is night time now, so that I cannot make out their faces. It occurs to me that they are stalking me and planning to mug me, but I am not afraid. I don’t feel threatened at all.

Commentary:

This is a precognitive, warning dream. My companions at the start of the dream personify both the many facets of my personality and the Spirit Questors. The main message of the dream is “NO TRESPASSING”. Elementals are involved here: the people people walking ahead of me in the forest and the two big, black men behind me.

The dream offers a resolution: “Face the window that looks out to the east and light yellow incense the minute you see the sun rising.”



Tuesday, October 21, 2008:

A cool dawn. Chito’s day off from work at Sanctuarium. After breakfast, I kiss my granddaughters goodbye.

5:50 AM train, Cubao MRT Station. Jeepney to Arquiza, where I drop by an antique dealer’s shop to check out a wooden-frame Chinese lantern that the owner, an old friend, has pledged to give me as a gift. Some of the hand-painted glass panes need to be replaced. The lantern has a red tassel. It is beautiful!

Arrive work 6:55 AM. Later in the morning some co-workers and I visit Mall of Asia, the venue for our upcoming U.S. Election Watch program. During lunch break in the staff room Chuck Loyola of HR tells me that he saw me on TV Sunday night at 10:00 PM—probably the Spirit Questors’ pre-Halloween episode on “Trip Na Trip” replayed on The Filipino Channel for global viewing.

I leave work at 4:30 PM with Agnes Caballa, who drops me off at GMA Kamuning MRT Station. I take the 5:50 PM. I halt at the staircase leading to the tricycle queue on Pinatubo Street. I am mortified.

Amidst the melee of commuters trudging up and down the staircase, my eyes zoom in on a little girl with emaciated limbs. She is lying down on a blanket on the lower landing of the staircase. She seems incapable of movement, but her brain and her eyes are very much alive. Her eyes follow with delight, a group of college students passing by, as though she is happy to see them and expects them to stop and talk to her. Only afterwards do I notice that the girl is lying on the lap of a woman. Another, elder, woman, stands beside them with a bag.

Something is wrong with this picture. The girl and the two women are modestly dressed and are impeccably clean. The first thought that crosses my mind is that a syndicate is using this disabled girl to solicit money from people. A plastic cup (TAZA) is on the concrete landing at the first woman’s knees. It gradually fills up with coins. Two or three charitable people hand the seated woman paper bills. I know that I must stop and do something, but I cannot. I am momentarily riveted, mostly out of denial. The girl looks exactly like my 13-year-old granddaughter Angelique, when she was younger. I tell myself, “Oh my God, it’s Angelique!” This is how she would have looked like had she been disabled in any way. I run away in denial and take a tricycle home.

Before bedtime I tell Chito, Ivy, Angelique, and Aubrey about the little girl on the staircase. No one believes me.

In bed, before sleeping, I pray to Father Fernando Suarez of Canada to heal the little girl . I telepathically reach out to him. I pray for her healing also to the orishas who are represented on the Santeria altar inside my bedroom.

I sleep 9:45 PM – 4:13 AM.

I have a dream:

“Medicine”:

I am naked inside my bedroom and start getting dressed for work. My youngest sister, Sylvia, saunters into the room and asks me for medicine, but I don’t have what she needs. She then places a bottle of healing balm and some other medicinal items inside my medicine cabinet. Sylvia then transforms into Angelique.

Moments later, my younger brother (I don’t have one in real life) also saunters into the room. He, too, asks for medicine. He sees Angelique eating up the last few pieces of a chocolate bar she has been nibbling on, and says that he wishes he had some too. I assure him that everything is all right; I bought chocolates for everyone.

Commentary:

In this dream, Sylvia is my anima. My Higher Self is clearly asking me to assist that little girl to heal, impossible as it may have seemed by her appearance that afternoon; I thought that she was dying. The little boy in my dream represents my Selfish Self—because, instead of stopping and giving alms, I ran away. My Selfish Self is need not only of healing but of affection (chocolate).



Wednesday, October 22, 2008

5:50 AM train, Cubao MRT Station. I take a jeepney to Arquiza. Arrive at work 7:23 AM.

I text the Spirit Questors about the girl on the Cubao MRT Station. I ask them to check her out. No one responds.

I call Joscephine Gomez this morning. She invites me to be one of the guests on her interview show "Creative Solutions" for her November 1 (All Saints Day) episode.

12:15 NN - 1:00 PM, I give a brown-bag presentation titled "Models of the Psyche and the Creative Writing Process" to six American Language Training officers, mostly from the Consular Section. I invite them to attend the National Book Awards, now sponsored by Manila Critics Circle and the National Book Development Board (and henceforth to be held in November, National Book Month, rather than during the September International Book Fair as it used to be). The Awards will be held at Yuchengco Museum 6:00 PM November 15. I know that Volume 4 of my "The Collected Works of Tony Perez", "Tatlong Paglalakbay: Bombita, Biyaheng Timog, Sa North Diversion Road)" is a finalist for the Drama Category.

I arrive home 6:15 PM and reset the microwave clock in the kitchen. There must have been a brownout some time today.

Ivy tells me that she walked through the MRT Cubao Station from Farmers Market but found no such girl as the one I described on any of the staircases.

I kiss my granddaughters good night: Angelique in the family room, Aubrey in the kitchen.

I am in bed by 7:27 PM.

I sleep 9:40 PM - 4:15 AM.


I have a dream:

"Antique Furniture"

My workplace has been transported to or merged with my house. I have lots of antique furniture around me. A Chinese coromandel screen topples over and smashes; I will have to have it repaired later. Bruce Armstrong, both the former Cultural Affairs Officer and my former supervisor, comments on the amount of antique pieces I have managed to amass over the years, the most recent an armoire with many compartments.

The Ambassador's room is adjacent to mine. She is scolding one of her aides, a man whose name is Mark, and my co-workers and I dive off my bed to hide from her. Bruce laughs at us and informs us that someone was able to tip off that Mark is a communist Party member.

Later Bruce transforms into Rosie, a former locally-engaged Cultural Affairs Office secretary. She has her daughter, Leah, who is seven years old and wearing a gown in this dream, in tow. I approach her and ask her why she is wearing glasses, but I get no reply. I marvel at how time flies, at the fact that Leah used to be a baby and is now seven years old. I look inside another antique armoire and discover some candy that I stashed away last Christmas.

Commentary:

The armoire represents my Unconscious. The Ambassador is a female elemental of authority; Mark, a minion who has committed a grievous offense.

The motif of the little girl is present in this dream: Leah, Angelique, the sick girl on the staircase.

Once again there is candy, a craving for affection.