Once upon a morning

It’s 4 a.m. and I’m wide-awake. I knew this would happen since I slept early at around nine last night. I tried to read but couldn’t finish a page. I didn’t even bother to turn on my computer or watch TV. I had a long day and I just drifted off to dreamland, my planned work undone.

It is still dark outside but I am bright and perky, ready to start my day, my mind full of things to do — marketing, grocery shopping (we’re out of toilet paper), pay bills, meet deadlines. I have a column to write, articles to edit, statements to draft, and a couple of meetings to attend. And yes, it is just a few days to D-Day when income tax returns must be filed. I have seen the new form online. It is daunting in its demand for details. Will I ever figure it out? The thought of having to accomplish the complicated ITR form has given me sleepless nights. So much to do, so little time.

I list down my immediate tasks, hoping to finish everything before the weekend so I can keep my two days off free. I will be super-stressed but I’ll get it all done. I work best on a deadline. I turn on my computer to get a head start on my workday, but I am distracted, unable to focus. There is too much going on in my head and in the world outside.

I live in a small guarded subdivision with over 100 townhouses amid the narrow streets of Mandaluyong. Outside our gates, the houses are built cheek by jowl and street parties and videoke can last till 2 a.m. when the cocks start crowing. I used to lie awake until the singers called it a night but I’ve gotten used to it. Unabashed videoke and noisy roosters are givens in a mixed and tightly packed neighborhood like mine.

Another constant in my neighborhood, my unit in particular, are pigeons, dozens of them that roost in the plant boxes outside my bedroom windows. When I first moved here, I was charmed at the sight of the birds building nests, laying eggs and feeding their young so close to my desk right within my line of vision. But there’s really nothing poetic or pretty about pigeons. My windows stink from bird poo and day and night, there is a buzz in my room from the sound they make. They don’t actually coo, they produce a low gurgling sound and flap their wings noisily. If you’re not used to it, at night, it can be frightening, like something out of a zombie movie.

I go over in my head everything I’ve researched on how to get rid of these blasted birds. A picture or figurine of an owl against my windowpane didn’t drive them away. Hanging an inflatable yellow ball with small mirrors pasted on it outside my window was supposed to terrify pigeons but one day I saw a bunch of them perched defiantly on top of the ball. I still have to try putting rubber snakes on my windowsills but a friend in Australia who has the same problem told me it doesn’t work. Several times, my landlord has used a BB gun to shoot the pigeons and those he felled have ended up on his dinner table. But this hasn’t driven the birds away. There seems to be no end to their occupation of my plant boxes. I guess these pigeons have decided to call my house their home.

There are also my neighbors’ yapping dogs that cause a ruckus every time a vehicle or a group of people pass by. And one of my neighbors has, literally, a houseful of cats so you won’t find rats darting through the streets of our subdivision. But this also means we have regular concerts by cats in heat, their moaning incessant and decidedly sexual, followed by a quick scuffle and satisfied cat sighs. I can only imagine the scene on my neighbor’s hot tin roof.

Momentarily, I long for my daughter’s home in the outskirts of Sydney, where I have slept long and well through the quietest nights. There are no cocks crowing, no barking dogs, no pesky pigeons littering the windowsill, no cats moaning in the heat of passion. To be back there would be the greatest pleasure. But then comes our scrappy aspin (or asong Pinoy), Ice Tea, looking for his early morning tummy rub. He snaps me out of my reverie and brings me back to the reality of living amid unwelcome noise in this crowded city.

Meanwhile, it’s getting light outside. The house is starting to stir. A gate creaks open. Someone is sweeping away leaves on the street below. I finally get cracking on my work plan for the day. As I sit at my desk, Ice Tea settles lazily at my feet. All’s well with my world. It will be a productive day.