So there I was — inside a private room in Asian Hospital where Mulong Palis, a dear friend from college, was being treated for a more serious strain of dengue — pirouetting before him, trying very hard to bring him some sense of joy, some sense of life. I continued my fleeting flamboyance, never mind if my arabesque was short and faulty. At least, in my own little weird way, I was able to make the patient laugh when I visited him. He had not been smiling for a few days ever since he was confined in the hospital. But I came in with the gift of joy and laughter. He smiled. He laughed. I never knew my pretentious ballerina stints — while wearing that invisible tutu — could somehow aid in healing him.
But a few days before that forgettable performance of mine, Mulong’s family and friends were walking time bombs of uncertainties. Why not when his platelet count dipped to a very critical level of 7,000 (normal count is at least 150,000) even after 16 bags of blood transfusion. He was already showing signs of hemorrhage. His gums were bleeding. His liver was already affected. He was bloated; his skin, ashen. But his spirit was still fighting. And we, his friends and family, formed a positive house of prayer in the air through text and e-mail messages.
“It was a close call but a battle well-fought,” Janice, Mulong’s wife, happily told us, a day after Mulong was discharged from the hospital. Janice and Mulong were my blockmates in college. We joined the UPLB Com Arts Society — the 32-year-old academic organization of BA Communication Arts students in UP Los Baños — together with six others in June 1988 with Mulong as our batch leader. (Mulong, during the night of our demanding yet exciting initiation rites to the soc, told me and my other batchmates in his IS (International School) accent: “Batchmates, don’k quit!” Twenty years later, in his hospital room, I found myself telling him the same line, albeit in a colegiala tone.)
You see, in our org, we take friendship seriously — even after graduation. Friendship is the wool that keeps us warm. It is the cordial cord that makes us connected; the glue that bonds us together. We may never see each other every day — even for years — but the band of brotherhood hovers above us 24/7. In those days when we were just discovering ourselves how to fly, the friendship we forged in the org became our wings. Because we were far away from our parents, our “brods” and “sisses” in the soc became our immediate family in UPLB. In our tambayan, we sang away our joys and fears, our hopes and dreams, even hunger. To this day, I have yet to meet soc alumni whose hearts don’t yearn to see even a glimpse of the UPLB. The university, courtesy of the org we belong to, did not only teach us to be critical. It also taught us to care. So, whether the alumni express it or not, their love for the Com Arts Soc remains.
That is why, in the arms of Com Arts Soc alumni and residents, Mulong, in his time of need, found a family again. We vowed not to allow a pesky mosquito get the better of him or, in any event, any of us. Knowing that every minute was critical, the “brods” and “sisses” of the “soc” were kept abreast all the time about Mulong’s condition. Dayday Cabrera, a sis, and I took it upon ourselves to be the messengers of news — however serious, however grim, however fatalistic.
Dayday, who is also Mulong’s female best friend, would almost have a heart attack every time she would find out about his deteriorating condition. She swore Mulong’s neck-in-neck fight with life strengthened her faith as she called on all the saints including Sta. Maria Elementary School.
One brod, with his pregnant wife in tow, came to the hospital all the way from Marikina in the middle of the night, ready to donate his Type O blood. One elder sis was able to find connections at the Red Cross and sent people to the hospital with bags of blood. Another one wanted to donate but she was of different blood type. So, a little past midnight, she brought the brother of her girl friend but not without plucking him out first from his workplace.
Another sis came to visit Mulong with a battalion of men who were possible donors. (She probably did not know that some of the men she brought to the hospital were high on drugs and that they couldn’t donate blood.)
Many were willing to give at least 500 cc of their blood but they were rejected because they were either 1) diabetic; 2) hypertensive; 3) anemic; 4) currently taking anti-depressants; or 5) had tattoos. (Yup, if your tattoos are just one-year-old, you can’t donate blood.) Oh well, they said, it’s the thought that counts. So, instead, they continued to storm the gates of heaven.
It was also very interesting to note that a soc resident (a resident is a young member of the org who is still enrolled in the university) was more than willing to donate blood to Mulong but her physical condition wouldn’t allow it. So, she brought her mother to the hospital instead. Problem was, the daughter did not brief the mother what the latter was getting herself into. But it was too late for her to back out especially so when she heard the advocacy of her daughter to save a life. But, as they say, all is well that ends well. (“Yo, Momma, your donation helped save Mulong! You’re a hero!”)
Our brods and sisses abroad were also worried. One even queried — in the hope of breaking the ice — how to send blood donation via FedEx. Those whose presence was not felt for a long time all so suddenly made apparitions at Mulong’s room.
“They say that in life’s greatest adversity, you find your true friends. In this case, we did not only find true friends, we found a family in Com Arts Soc,” Janice wrote in our e-group.
In times of crisis, it truly helps to know that there are people who care. If things can be done with a happy heart, you are somehow assured that things will be all right.
(Thank you for all your letters. For your new beginnings, please e-mail me at bumbaki@yahoo.com or my.new.beginnings@gmail.com. You may also send me snail mail at The Philippine Star, c/o Allure Section, R. Oca corner Railroad Streets, Port Area, Manila. Have a blessed Sunday!)