Laments over lunch

For the first time in months I have free time to do whatever it is I feel like doing. No more working on jewelry to sell at a bazaar. No more teaching, at least for a while. No more mandatory things to do. So what was the first thing I decided to do? Take my old friends to lunch. Just before I left I received a text from a childhood friend. She was lamenting the death of good English grammar.

Why do people say, “Shared to” when it should be “shared with”? she wanted to know. I sighed. It’s because in Pilipino, which used to be Tagalog, we have only one preposition — “sa,” which they liberally translate into “to.” 

Why do they use the word “jewelries” when our generation knew there is no plural for “jewelry” in American English, or “jewellery” in British English? Just as there is no plural for the collective nouns “luggage,” “baggage” and “furniture.” Anybody who says “luggages,” “baggages” and “furnitures” just receives a patient smile from me but they don’t make it in my book.

I definitely shared her annoyance at these items.  I decided that at lunch I would do a survey of what people hate most these days.  I asked my small, very pretty friend, whom I love dearly. “The father of my children,” she said. She meant her husband, whom she has been actively hating since she found out he had had many women and an illegitimate child. We all understand that. 

What I don’t understand is why she doesn’t throw him out and live a life all her own. If I were in her shoes I would hire a private detective to track down the address of the woman with whom he has a child, drive him over and leave him with her.  Then I would give the address to his children and say, “If you want to see your father, you may visit him there anytime.” Then I would build my own life. But she has not. 

“I hate the traffic,” says the most senior among us. “It drives me up the wall. Once I tried to go from Magallanes to Rockwell; it took me three hours to get there.” I understood that. Once I tried to get from Makati to Greenhills on a non-rainy but payday Friday night and it took me two hours. I swore never to do that again. These days I don’t go out on Friday nights. What am I talking about? Nobody asks me out on any night, so … no problem.

“What do you hate?” I asked the latecomer. “Politics,” she said. “That makes two of us,” I said, but how come you haven’t spoken of anything else since you came in? She had talked about Miriam Defensor Santiago, Johnny Ponce Enrile, Mar Roxas, Korina Sanchez, Anderson Cooper … all sorts of political gossip. I rather enjoyed stories about Boots Anson-Roa marrying King Rodrigo in June. I know them both. Boots and I modeled together when we were 13-year-old children on the cover of Woman and the Home. We are old friends. King and I met a few years later when there were many jam sessions at their home. They are two old friends and I am happy they are getting married. I wish them all the happiness.

What do I hate? People who read and don’t understand. That really drives me up the wall and stretches my patience to the limit. People who send me texts saying, “I read about this event in your column. Where is it going to be?” Impulsively I want to text back and say, “Please read the last paragraph. I wrote when and where it would be.” But I count to a hundred and then send them the answer and hopefully they understand. By this time my teeth are shorter from gritting.

I write:  “I will be at a bazaar this weekend only.” They think I will be there forever. Then they text frantically saying, “I am here looking for you but you aren’t here.” Well, of course I’m not there. Did you not read the bazaar would be in the middle of November? We are in December now. “Ay, I did not understand it. I thought you would be selling there all the time, until I could come over and visit you.” Do I know you? I want to ask sometimes. I don’t know you. So why would I wait for you to visit me?

We all have our laments. Our own laments are very reasonable to us but not that reasonable even to our friends. But when we talk about them it gives us some relief, some joy. It leaves us with a light feeling to take home. I enjoy discussing laments with the ladies with whom I lunch.

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Please text your comments to 0917-915-5570. By the way, I am selling at White Space on Pasong Tamo Extension tomorrow, Sunday, only for one day.