ANO ANG MINAHAL KO SAYO?

Ang ningning sa iyong mga mata

Ang init ng iyong balat
Ang iyong hininga sa aking leeg
Na siyang napapanginig sa aking kaibuturan

Ang dampi ng iyong mga kamay

Ang amoy ng iyong buhok
Ang kakulitan ng iyong ngiti
Yang mga titig mo na kay tibay

Ang halik ng iyong mga labi

Ang katawan mo kapag malapit sa akin
Ang lapat ng iyong mga hawak
Ang umaayos ng lahat sa akin

Ang kahabagan na iyong hawak

Ang kapangyarihan sa iyong awra
Ang tibok ng iyong puso
Na sana wag na matapos ang ating mga yakap

Ang kagandahan ng iyong halik

Ang kapangyarihan ng iyong hipo
Ang mga ito at marami pang iba
Kung bakit kita mahal
 WAG KANG LALAYO, KAHIT ISANG ARAW

Wag kang lalayo, kahit isang araw, dahil-

Dahil- hindi ko alam kung paano ko sasabihin: mahaba ang isang araw
At ako ay maghihintay sayo,
Na parang istasyon na wala pang tao

Kapag ang mga tren ay nakaparada

Na parang natutulog pa.

Wag mo akong iwan kahit isang oras dahil

kahit ang pinakamaliliit na hapis
ay unti unting maglalaho
Nakukulapulan ng usok
Paglalayuin kami ng paghahanap ko ng bahay
Nagpapasidhi sa kirot ng pusong nasaktan

O, wag naman sanang mawala ang iyong silweta

Sa baybayin;
Harinawa ang iyong talukap ay di kumurap
Sa distansiya ng kawalan
Wag mo akong iwan kahit Segundo, aking pinakamamahal

Dahil kung sa mga oras na ikaw ay lalayo

Ako ay maglalakabay sa buong mundo, nagtatanong
Babalik ka ba?O iiwan ako?na unti unting mamatay
 WHAT DO YOU REMEMBER

She wriggled, squirmed, just a little, but a little was too much. It started as a shimmy at her hips and
twisted up through her shoulders, reminding her of the rippling way a wet dog shakes itself dry. Her
eyes were closed but she could see herself all the same: her feet in white cotton socks, her solid, good-
looking legs, and the dark blue dress stretched lewdly tight across her hips.

She opened her eyes. What she saw in the dressing room mirror confirmed her expectations except for
one thing, the slack, drawn look on her face, jarring because it did not match the view of her face that
she carried around inside her, which was freckly and kindly and had always been that way.

The next thing she knew she was reaching for the zipper, the too-tight dress pulling upward in a way
that was quite appalling in the mirror, and she yanked on the zipper and it went up though she quit a
few inches from the top. Why did I even do that? she wondered.

It looked like a shrunken, perverse Sunday school outfit, complete with sailor-suit trim around the collar.
On the hanger it had been a conservative, navy blue linen dress, but every woman knows: the dress
when it’s on the hanger is not the dress when you put it on. The tag scratched her; she scraped it free of
her neck and looked at it—the price was obscenely high. Something obscene about how her hips looked,
too, in that dress, and she thought how her hips, at that moment, looked the way her cousin Roberta’s
hips used to look, but this was a silly, strange idea so she thought of the price of the dress again, and
then the oddest memory came to her, of the rehearsal dinner for her wedding twenty years before and
something Roberta had said there: he must have more money than you think, because why else would
you marry a man twenty-five years older than you?

She hadn’t thought of her unkind cousin Roberta in years—unkind, always, perhaps because she had an
ugly name and resented this—this is what she had thought when she was a child and Roberta was a
child too, a very unkind child.

No, Roberta, you were wrong—but had she said this at the time? She couldn’t remember. The rehearsal
dinner had been held at a restaurant overlooking the ocean in Maine, in a big dark stone house on an
old estate. She remembered the dinner better than the wedding, not the food, but the setting (just as
she remembered the site for the wedding better than the wedding itself, which was, in memory, just a
blur of bodies in tuxedos and bright dresses, like a photograph taken of the scene, where the people
were out of focus because they were moving, while the clean white hotel and the too-pretty village of
Boothbay Harbor were frozen sharp and colorful).

She wondered what it was about the big stone house on the cliff that moved her so much more than the
picture- postcard charm of Boothbay Harbor. She thought of the stone of the inn as the same stone
rising out of the ocean beneath it, that dark rock with the waves crashing on it, looking so wet and black
as each wave receded, but she wasn’t sure at all it was the same stone, and she couldn’t actually
visualize the building, though she could sense it around her and feel the power of the waves crashing
below and the mystery of the gray sea extending mistily forever. Her parents had given her this, this
wildness, this roughness, the evening before her wedding, then spirited her to the protected waters of
Boothbay Harbor, to that page from a picture calendar of the quaint hamlets of Maine, to be married.
Even though she was twenty-five years old at the time, her parents had insisted on paying for
everything, keeping her childlike in those final moments before her marriage began to the fifty-year-old
man she’d chosen.

And now she was forty-eight, and he seventy-three, and they had two kids in college, and here she was
all alone in this white, high-ceilinged dressing room, down a long corridor of dressing rooms in a city
department store once fashionable but now in a long decline. It was too brightly fluorescent-lit, with
pins and lint across its bare tile floor and a door that banged like the door of a toilet stall.

She knew people had assumed she was marrying a father-figure. She reminded herself that she had
never thought of him that way.

She thought, I did think of him as handsome and older. Who’s to say what was working in the deeper
layers of my psyche and so what who cares?

She started to reach to unzip the dress, but hesitated. She’d always figured they were simply jealous—
jealous of her handsome groom, jealous, even, of the chance to marry someone taboo in that way—and
she shared a coy smile with herself in the mirror.

Then her face was back to business: and I always put it down to a quirk of fate, she told herself, that the
man I was destined to marry was older than I was. Destined, as in absolutely destined, as in the first time
she saw him she said to herself here is the man I will marry, though he was her fiancé’s uncle. She had
known even as she thought it (here is the man I will marry) that the situation would cause a lot of fuss,
though she had been as surprised as anybody when the ex-fiancé cut his uncle’s bicycle in half with a
hacksaw. It couldn’t be helped, theirs was a fairy tale love, and in her girlish way she’d assumed that
everyone would have to see this. Their love had seemed grand but it had also seemed simple, the love
of a girl and a boy, though he was much more a man than a boy, and she was more a young girl than she
could know at twenty-five.

The drama of the ex-fiancé and the sawed-apart bicycle had passed from personal memory into family
mythology— her boys had heard the story, and that’s what it was to them, a story, an old one from
another time, an unremarkable part of who they were, and she decided now that something had been
lost in translation. She used to think, when they were little, how wonderful it was that they were the
accident of their parents’ accidental love. She wondered whether they ever thought about that, now
that they were so grown. She imagined not. They might think of it, if they ever had children of their own.
She couldn’t picture herself as a grandmother—she felt much younger on the inside than that. And their
father . . . That was another thing they took for granted—the age difference between their parents, it
was as if it were something that simply was, that had always been, and there had never existed the
possibility that things could have gone differently.

The ex-fiancé did not come to the wedding. It hadn’t bothered her at the time, but it seemed a little sad
now. All that craziness was in the past—he had married, had kids of his own. She was always relieved to
think of this.

She tried to remember her husband’s face, how he had looked on their wedding day, and she couldn’t, it
was a blank—she could see his tux, the crispness of it, the way he held himself—he’d always had a way
of looking completely relaxed standing completely straight—and she could see his beautiful hands,
although maybe this was because his hands were one part of him that had not changed. They were
perhaps less firm, a little less there between the skin and the bone.

She had a better picture of herself at their wedding, but that’s what it was, a picture, because that long-
ago day had become a photograph. In it, she was running down the hotel steps, her magical one-day-
only dress lifting like a snowy butterfly’s wings behind her, and she was floating on the arm of her new
husband, whose face was turned to her in laughter, while she faced the camera, eyes dark and wild, her
mouth open, excited, wondering.

The photographer’s work had made it last forever even as it turned it into a confection, with the same
sugar-white, impossible, inedible look about it that wedding cakes have. It sat on her dressing table,
behind other pictures from the years since. She wondered, what did her husband remember of her?
Was it, for him, the way it was for her—a grasping for memory, but coming up, only, with the things that
hadn’t changed—for her, the tall and easy way he held himself, and his beautiful hands.

If she forced herself, she could picture the way he was now, as clearly as any objective observer. But it
required effort—the reality did not match the idea of him she carried around inside her, just as her own
face, caught by surprise in the mirror, had not matched. She thought, isn’t that strange? And she
wondered if it was that way for other people, for other women when they looked at their husbands.

This was the exact opposite of how it had been with her children, who instead of persisting in outdated
images were in the business of constantly replacing old ideas of themselves with new ones, so
effectively that she could never remember quite how they had been before. She had realized this just a
couple of years ago, when her elder son’s then girlfriend asked her what he’d been like as a baby. She
had resented the question at the time, partly because she suspected the girl was not so much interested
as trying to impress, and partly because she couldn’t really say. And also because she never really liked
that girl. She offered that as a boy he was always outside, always so busy with his friends, never wanted
to come in except for dinner, but this obviously did not satisfy the girlfriend who leaned forward waiting
for more. How could she explain that as he grew, each phase obliterated the one before it?

This, she suspected, was why parents kept all those framed pictures of their children at different ages—
to remind them, to help them keep from losing those certainties completely.

But wasn’t it strange that a grown mother like herself, with two grown kids, would be standing here in
this overpriced ugly dress that didn’t fit, thinking about her wedding? Thinking about things like her
cousin’s fat hips from twenty years ago, and the way the sea crashed on the rocks at her rehearsal
dinner?

She stared at herself, steady in the mirror—the fact is he is still healthy, he is still handsome, he is still in
damn good shape, and the fact is he is getting old the way everybody knew he would, he is at last
getting old, and I don’t know how these two things can be true at once and yet they are.

She reached for the zipper, to get out of that dress and get out of that place, and she took a breath in,
anticipating the relief of it as her fingertips grasped the little tongue of metal, and then she tugged on it,
gently, but the zipper was stuck.

She paused, just a second, and tugged down again, harder, and it was still stuck.
And then, without a thought, she did the logical thing: she pulled upward on the zipper just a bit, to see
if this would free it. It slid upward with liquid ease; she was careful to take it up only an inch. She relaxed
her fingers, preparing to reverse direction, and in that moment before she tried again she felt a small,
apprehensive tingle. She tugged. It stayed stuck.

She dropped her arms to her sides. She breathed more quickly. A flurry of thoughts ran through her
head, confusing, too fast to figure: how if her husband were there he would fix it, how absurd this was
since he would never be there, in a women’s dressing room, how when he was gone someday, she
would have to fix stuck zippers herself, how the world was full of widows with the same problem, how,
when you reach a certain age, being a widow is the norm.

Something came back she hadn’t realized she had forgotten, a small, terrible episode—their trip to the
home improvement store the weekend before. It was an enormous store with endless aisles where it
was impossible to find anything, and as they had stood waiting to talk to an employee who was busy
talking to someone else, she’d wondered where had all the regular-sized, ordinary hardware stores
gone? But looking at her husband, she saw that he was feeling good there, happy in hardware-land; he
had an I-can-wait-all-day look on his face as he gazed down the long aisle of light bulbs and electrical
outlets and switches and wire. She turned her attention to the salesperson, to his bright orange apron,
his bright young face, his head-full of dark chaotic hair—that was the fashion now, hair that was short
but looked as if it had tumbled straight from bed—and she noted the genial way he talked to the man he
was helping, the way he called him “buddy” and, a moment later, “bud,” a big wide open grin on his face
the whole time. Done at last, the sales clerk turned to her husband (not to her, she noticed; she was just
tagging along, standing by, not a participant but a wife). The young man’s body transformed—it came
over him, she thought, like some lightning-quick costume change in a play—he lost his brash, straight
posture and his big grin, and his face fell serious, all patience, a bit dubious, and he made his voice too
loud and nodded a lot and bent forward as if speaking to a child. Her husband just kept talking, gesturing
with his hands, asking, agreeing, qualifying. And she was glad then to be standing by, to be allowed to be
invisible, because she could not bear to be more a part of what she saw.

Tears were starting to her eyes—she had to concentrate on the zipper. She grasped it, prepared to ease
it up a quarter of an inch—she would have to move it just a little at a time. It started to slide; it went up,
slippery, easy, more and more, all in one slick movement, all the way to the top where it locked, settled,
stopped cold.

Oh dear, she thought. Oh no.

It had happened so suddenly. Too fast for her to stop herself.

She pulled at the zipper, down and up and sideways, every angle she could, pulling so hard that her
fingers slid off it again and again and stung where the bump on the little metal blade dug into her
fingertip. In the mirror her hips spread in battle-stance over her stocking feet planted wide on the floor.
No! she thought, please! Her face hardened as she watched her own struggle reflected back to her. No!
she thought, no!

She caught her eye in the mirror and her face was fierce and exhausted and ugly. She stopped, blinked
at her reflection. She did not try to make her face look nice. All of a sudden she needed to sit down, but
there was nothing around her but four bare walls and if she sat on the floor she would split that dress.
She wanted out of there, but she couldn’t go out, not dressed like that, but how could she stay? Her
eyes, in the mirror, gave her back her only option, and it was horrifying—to walk out, in that dress, look
for a sales girl, look and hunt and wander around, in front of all those other women milling about the
store, watching her while they pretended to be interested in pawing at blouses on racks.

Look at me, she thought. I look just awful. She stared at herself, but was addressing her husband: you
used to tease me how marriage to me would keep you young, and I used to tease you back, how maybe
it would make me old instead. And now look. Look at me.

She reached again for the zipper, because there was nothing else to do, and it was still stuck, which did
not surprise her. She indulged an image of her husband’s hands—his beautiful, strong hands at her neck,
grasping the errant zipper, working it free. She could see the gentle way they moved, see the thin skin,
the blue veins, the bony knuckles she could picture kissing.

Oh, sweetheart, she thought, look at us, look at the two of us.

Her eyes stung again but she stopped herself, stopped any tears before they came. She thought, I must
do it, I must ask him, what does he remember of me from long, long ago? Only the unchanging things?
Yes, I’ll ask him, what do you remember?

She would tell him what she remembered. She would tell him how it was, how if she closed her eyes—
like this— she could be back at the inn above the sea, the horizon lost in mist as she stared into it, into
her future. The waves rolled in on the black rocks, crashing there into white froth and into spray that
drifted upward, reaching her lips with its salt.
 ANO ANG NAAALALA MO

Siya ay kumislot, at humaltak. Kaunti lamang. Ang paghaltak ay nagsimula sa pagkislot ng kanyang puwit
hanggang sa pagtaas at baba ng kanyang mga balikat na para bang isang basang asong ipinapagpag ang
katawan upang magpatuyo. Nakapikit man ngunit nakikita pa rin niya ang kanyang sarili; ang mga paa
niyang nababalutan ng puting medyas, ang buo at magaganda niyang mga binti, at ang matingkad na
asul na bestidang kahalay-halay na nakabalot nang mahigpit sa kaniyang puwit.

Iminulat niya ang kanyang mga mata. Ang nakita niyang repleksiyon mula sa salaming iyon ng dressing
room ang nagkumpirma sa kaniyang mga inaasahan maliban sa isang bagay. Ang matamlay na hitsura ng
kanyang mukha na nakakadismaya dahil hindi ito tumutugma sa kaniyang nararamdaman.

Hindi niya namalayan na hinihila na niya pataas ang zipper upang isara ang masyadong mahigpit na
bestida. Ngunit itinigil niya ito sa ilang huling pulgada bago ito tuluyang magsara. "Bakit ko nga ba iyon
ginawa?" Siya ay nagtaka.

Ito ay nagmistulang nangulubot na damit-pansimba na tinernohan pa ng kuwelyo. Kapag nakasabit sa

hanger, isa iyong asul na bestidang nababagay sa mga babaeng konserbatibo. Ngunit alam ng bawat
babae na ang damit na nasa hanger ay hindi ang damit kapag nasa katawan mo na ito. Kumahig sa
kaniyang leeg ang etiketa kaya inalis niya ito at tiningnan ang presyo na pagkamahal-mahal. Napansin
niya na kung ano ang hitsura ng kanyang puwit sa bestidang iyon ay ganoon din ang hutsura ng puwit ng
pinsan niyang si Roberta. Isa itong walang kwenta at kakaibang ideya kaya't pinagisipan na niyang muli
ang presyo ng bestida na nagpaalala naman sa kaniya ng isang kakaibang nakaraan -- ang hapunan
matapos ang kaniyang kasal dalawampung taon na ang nakalilipas at ang sinabi sa kaniya ni Roberta
noon: "Marahil ay mas mayaman pa siya kaysa sa iniisip mo, dahil bakit mo nga naman pakakasalan ang
isang lalaking mas matanda sa iyo ng dalawampung limang taon?"

Ilang taon na rin niyang kinalimutan ang matapobre niyang pinsan na masama na ang ugali noon pa man
marahil ay dahil na rin sa panget nitong pangalan na kaniyang lubhang kinasusuklaman.

"Nagkakamali ka Roberta," ang sabi niya sa sarili ngunit kailanman ay hindi ito nalaman ng pinsan.
Naganap ang salu-salo sa isang restawran kung saan matatanaw ang Maine, sa isang malaking lumang
bahay na bato. Mas tumatak sa isip niya ang hapunang iyon kaysa sa mismong seremonyas ng kasal --
hindi ang pagkain kundi ang bawat tagpo.

Ang kanyang nga magulang ang nagbigay sa kanya ng mga iyon -- ang ligalig at ang pagkamagaspang
para sa pag-aasawa.

Bagaman nasa wastong gulang na siya na dalawampu't lima, ipinilit pa rin ng mga magulang niya ang
pagsagot sa lahat ng gastusin, itinatrato pa rin siyang bata hanggang sa huling pagkakataon bago siya
makipag-isang dibdib sa limampung taong gulang na lalaki na kanyang pinili.

At ngayong siya ay apatnapu't walo na, ang asawa niya ay pitumpu't walo, at mayroon na silang
dalawang anak na sa kolehiyo, mag-isa siyang nakaupo sa loob ng isang puting kwarto sa loob ng
magarbong department store sa isang lungsod.
Hindi naman lingid sa kanyang kaalaman ang nasa isip ng mga tao na nagpakasal siya sa isang
matandang lalaki, sa isang lalaking may wangis ng isang ama.

"Oo nga't mas matanda siya sa akin ngunit makising naman siya. Hindi kailanman sumagi sa aking isip na
magpapakasal ako sa isang lalaking may wangis ng isang ama. Sino ba sila upang ako ay husgahan?"

Sinimulan niyang hubarin muli ang bestida ngunit nagdalawang-isip siya. Palagi na lang niyang iniisip na
marahil ay naiinggit lamang sila -- naiinggit dahil mayroon siyang makisig na mapapangasawa. Sinasabi
niya lagi sa sarili na nakatadhana siyang magpakasal sa isang matandang lalaki. Nakatadhana na sa
unang pagkakataon ng kanilang pagkikita ay naramdaman na agad niya ito, bagaman ang matanda ay
ang tiyuhin ng kaniyang dating kasintahan.

Alam niya na ang sitwasyong iyon ay magiging tampulan ng usapan ngunit nagulat ang lahat nang sirain
ng dati niyang kasintahan ang bisikleta ng tiyuhin. Ang pag-ibig nila ay tila dakila, at malaki, ngunit
medyo simple at maliit din. Para sa kanya, noong bata pa lamang sila, kamangha-manghang isipin na sila
ang bunga ng di-sinasadyang pag-ibig ng kanilang mga magulang.

Hindi dumating ang kanyang dating kasintahan sa araw ng kanyang kasal. Hindi ito nakapagpabagabag sa
kanya nang mga panahong iyon ngunit tila ba ikinalulungkot na niya ito ngayon bagaman may asawa na
rin ito at may mga anak na. Ikinapanatag naman ito ng loob niya.

Sinubukan niyang alalahanin kung ano ang hitsura ng asawa sa araw ng kanilang kasal ngunit hindi niya
ito maalala -- blangko. Nakikita niya ang suot nito at kung paano nito dalhin ang sarili. Palagi itong
nakatayo nang tuwid, kalmado. Nakikita rin niya ang magaganda nitong mga kamay.

Maganda ang litrato niya sa kasal, ngunit ang kagandahang ito ay marahil hanggang sa litrato na lamang.
Nakuha sa larawang iyon ang pagbaba niya sa hagdan suot ang kaakit-akit na damit-pangkasal habang
nakahawak sa braso ng kanyang asawa na kakikitaan ng tunay na ligaya.

Nagawa ng litratistang patagalin ang larawang ito nang panghabang-buhay. Inisip niya kung ano ba ang
naaalala ng kanyang asawa sa kanya. Kung ano man iyon, at sa kabila ng lahat ng bagay na nagbago sa
kanila, nananatili pa rin, para sa kanya, ang paraan kung paano dalhin ng kanyang asawa ang sarili at ang
magaganda nitong mga kamay.

Ang katotohanan ay hindi tumutugma sa ideya niya sa kanyang asawa, tulad ng kanyang sariling mukha
na nahuli ng salamin. Naisip niya, hindi ba kakaiba iyon? At siya ay nagtaka kung ganoon nga ba para sa
ibang tao, para sa ibang babae kapag tiningnan nila ang kanilang mga asawa.

Ito ang eksaktong kabaligtaran kung ano ang naging sitwasyon ng kanyang mga anak. Napagtanto niya
ito ilang taon na ang nakararaan, nang tanungin siya ng kasintahan ng anak na lalaki kung ano siya nang
ito ay bata pa. Nagpanting ang kanyang tainga sa tanong na iyon, marahil dahil hindi niya talaga masabi,
at dahil hindi niya talaga gusto ang babaeng iyon. Gayunpaman, sinabi niya na bilang isang batang lalaki
na palaging nasa labas at abala sa kanyang mga kaibigan, hindi nito kailanman ninais na pumasok
maliban sa oras ng hapunan. Maliwanag na hindi nasiyahan sa narinig na sagot, lalong humilig paunahan
ang kasintahan upang makarinig ng higit pa.

Ito marahil ang dahilan, sa palagay niya, kung bakit iniingatan ng mga magulang ang lahat ng mga naka-
frame na larawan ng kanilang mga anak sa iba't ibang edad -- upang ipaalala sa kanila, upang tulungan
silang panatilihing lubos ang mga nakasanayan.
Ngunit hindi ba kakaiba na ang isang matandang ina na tulad niya na may dalawang anak na nasa
wastong edad na, ay nakatayo rito, suot-suot ang pagkamahal-mahal na bestida na hindi husto sa kanya,
at nag-iisip tungkol sa kanyang kasal? Iniisip ang mga bagay tulad ng taba ng kanyang pinsan mula
dalawampung taon na ang nakalilipas?

Tinitigan niya ang sarili sa salamin -- " 'Yung totoo, malusog pa rin naman siya, makisig at nasa maayos
na postura. Tumatanda siya nang naayon sa inaasahan ng iba."

Hinawakan niya ang zipper upang hubarin ang bestida ngunit ayaw nitong mabuksan. Sandali siyang
tumigil, muling sumubok ngunit ganoon pa rin. Ilang beses niyang sinubukang itaas-baba abg zipper
ngunit tila ba ayaw pahubad ng bestida. Mabilis na ang kanyang paghinga.

Maraming bagay ang sumagi sa isip niya; nakakalito, nakakahilo. Na kung naroon ang asawa niya ay tiyak
na aayusin niya ito, na lubhang imposibleng mangyari na ang isang lalaki ay mapunta sa dressing room
para sa mga babae. Na kapag nawala na ang asawa ay siya na ang magkukumpuni sa mga nasirang
bagay. Paano nga ba na kapag narating mo ang edad na iyon, normal na ang pagiging isang balo?

Isa na namang nakalipas ang kanyang naalala, isang senaryo sa loob ng isang pagkalaki-laking tindahan
ng nga hardware, na tila lubhang kinawiwilihan ng asawa samantalang hinahanap niya ang mga lumang
simpleng tindahan. May kausap pang kostomer noon ang tindero at naghintay silang matapos ang tila
masayang kwentuhan at kamustahan ng dalawa. Matapos iyon ay nag-iba ang timpla ng mukha ng
tindero nang tumingin siya sa matandang lalaki. Patango-tango lamang ang tindero habang nakatingin sa
matandang walang tigil sa pag-imik, pagsenyas at pagtatanong. Laking pasasalamat niyang nakatayo
lamang siya roon at nagmistulang multo.

Nagsimula nang tumulo ang kanyang nga luha -- kailangan niyang pagtuunan ng pansin ang zipper. Muli
niyang sinubukang hubarin ang bestida hanggang sa nagkaroon na ng marka ng zipper ang dulo ng
kanyang mga daliri.

"Naku," naisip niya. "Hindi maaari."

Bakas ang pag-aalala sa kanyang mukha nang muli niyang tingnan ang sarili sa salamin. Hindi niya
sinubukang magmukhang maganda. Gusto na niyang makalabas mula sa lugar na iyon ngunit hindi niya
iyon magagawa kung suot niya ang bestidang iyon. Ayaw na niyang magtagal pa roon at mayroon
lamang isang paraan upang makaalis. At ito ay ang maglakad palabas suot ang damit na iyon sa harap ng
ibang mga babaeng naroon din sa department store.

"Tingnan mo ako. Ang sama ng aking hitsura." Tinitigan niyang sarili habang kausap ang asawa. "Madalas
mo akong tuksuhin noon na ang pagpapakasal sa akin ang makapagpapabata sa iyo ngunit tutuksuhin
kita pabalik na ang pagpapakasal sa iyo ang makapagpapatanda sa akin. At ngayon, tingnan mo ako."

Sa huling pagkakataon, muli siyang sumubok at hindi na niya ikinagulat ang resulta nito. Nagpalunod siya
sa imahe ng mga kamay ng kanyang asawa -- sa magaganda at malalakas nitong kamay sa kanyang leeg
habang tinutulungan siyang hubarin ang damit na iyon. Nakikita niya kung gaano ito kalumanay
gumalaw, ang manipis na balat, ang mga asul na litid.

"O aking mahal, tingnan mo tayo. Tumingin ka sa ating dalawa.

Humapding muli ang kanyang mga mata ngunit pinigilan niya ang kanyang mga luha sa pagpatak. Naisip
niya na nararapat niyang itanong sa asawa kung ano ang naaalala niya rito mula sa nakalipas.

Gayundin, isasalaysay niya kung ano ang kanyang naaalala, kung ano at paano ang lahat mula sa simula.

LOVE
Love can be defined as a strong bond between people. There are many types of love: brotherly love,
motherly love, love for pets, love for activities or places, and everyone's favorite- romantic love.

The purpose of this article is to focus solely on romantic love between two people. Romantic love will be
defined as a profoundly tender, passionate for another, including sexual desire and passion. It can be
the thing that makes you smile in the morning or the thing that makes you cry at night. A deep, true love
can be something that is bigger than obsession, a deeper connection with another human being in
which we can share our whole selves with the other person; our likes and dislikes, passions, fears,
memories (happy and sad), dreams, and spend quality time with each other.

Love is NOT lust, obsession, a competition, or a game. When it starts feeling like this it is a sign that it
may just be one of these things and not true, deep love. A quote I read the other day really struck my
mind: "We desire what we know will not last, but we love only those things which are eternal." It was
not credited to anyone and a Google search turned up nothing, but what matters here is the message.
Remember these words and tell yourself whenever you need to be reminded: It is better to be alone
than in bad company.

While it is true that any relationship needs compromise and work, there are limits. If you feel like you
are not happy or not being your true self, these are major signs that there is trouble. One of the signs I
have had in a past relationship was that a good friend of mine pointed out that every time I was asked
about my girlfriend that my face and voice tone changed. It took a friend pointing it out to make me
realize that I was in an unhealthy and unhappy relationship.
 GUGMA
An paghigugma san duha nga tawo puydi maimdan sa kusog saira pag upod. May-ada damo nga klase
san paghigugma: paghigugma saimo kabugtuan, paghigugma san imo iroy, paghigugma san imo alaga
nga kahayupan, paghigugma sa imo ginhihimo ugsa lugar nga nahihingadtuan, ngan an paborito san
kadam-an an paghigugma san tawo nga may maupay na karuyag sidngon saimo kinabuhi.

Karuyag igpasabot sini na may-ada mas hilarom na karuyag sidngon an paghigugma. An paghigugma nga
aton inaabat sa sayo nga tawo may-ada damo nga karuyag sidngon. Puydi mo siya maisplikar kun sa
kada aga napapalipay ka niya ugsa kada gab'i nga ginpapatangis ka niya. An ungod ug hilarom nga
paghigugma mas pa sa pagka-imos sa usa nga tawo. Pagka hilarom iyo pagkaupod: aram niyo iyo tagsa
ruyag ug dire, iyo ruyag himuon, iyo inkakahadukan, iyo malipay ngan magsurub'on nga mga
hinumduman, iyo ruyag mahingadtuan, ngan an kalipayon sa kada takna nga magkaupod kam.

An paghigugma dire la kabasta makusog nga pagkaruyag sa usa ug uyag. Sa takna nga nga ig-abat mo nq
iton, masusugad mo nga dire la ini basta ungod ug hilarom nga gugma. Sa usa nga barasahon nga ako
nahinumduman nga nag uuru-utro sa akon utok: "Ginruruyag ta an usa nga butang nga aram ta di mag-
iiha, ngan ginhihigugma ta an butang nga aram ta wara katampusan." Dire ini siya kabasta la nga pagkila
sa tawo sa pagkaimod mo sa Google sa wara la, an ginpapasiring sini an mismo nga karuyag sidngon san
surat. Permi hinumdumi nga ngan ig butang sa imo isipon nga: Mas maupay nga magin nagsayuan maski
di ka malipay, kaysa may-ada ka kaupod ugaring di kam malipay.

Nasusugad nga an pag-uupod nagkikinahanglan pagtangkod nga trabaho, may-ada gehapon tubtuban
iton. Kun saim huna-huna dire ka malipay ngan nagigin ungod sa imo kalugaringon, pasabot ini nga may-
ada dire mao nga nahihinabo. Usa nga pasabot sa akon sanhi, nga kun ginsisiring san akon sangkay an
akon 'jowa' naglalain an akon kahimo ug dire ak nagtitingog. Siton mismo nga ak inabat, gin-isplikar san
akon sangkay nga dire ak kunta nakapot pa kun dire man ak nalilipay na.
 Drowning in Dishes, but Finding a Home

by Danial Adkison from New York Times

The people who make a difference in your life come in all types. Some write on a chalkboard. Some wear
a sports uniform. Some wear a suit and tie. For me, that person wore a tie with a Pizza Hut logo on it.

I started working at Pizza Hut in December 1989, when I was a freshman in high school. Parents in my
small western Colorado town encouraged teenagers to work in the service industry after school and on
weekends. It kept us out of trouble.

Having a job also kept me out of the house. I grew up mostly with my mother, and I never knew my
biological father. My younger sister, younger brother and I went through a series of stepfathers. My
relationship with those men was almost always fraught, and I was always looking for reasons to be away
from home.

The Pizza Hut was old, and in the back it had three giant sinks instead of a dishwasher. One basin was for
soapy water, one for rinsing and the other for sanitizing, using a tablet that made me cough when I
dropped it into the hot water. All new employees started by washing dishes and busing tables. If they
proved their mettle, they learned to make pizzas, cut and serve them on wooden paddles and take
orders.

On my first night, the dishes piled up after the dinner rush: plates, silverware, cups and oily black deep-
dish pans, which came clean only with a lot of soap and scrubbing in steaming-hot water. I couldn’t keep
up, and stacks of dishes formed on all sides of me. Every time I made a dent in the pile, the call came
back for help clearing tables out front, and I returned with brown tubs full of more dirty dishes.

At home, the chore I hated most was dishes. A few years earlier, my mother’s then boyfriend instilled a
loathing of that task by making me scrub the Teflon off a cookie sheet, believing that it was grease, while
he sat on the couch and smoked cigarettes. That boyfriend was gone, but another with a different set of
problems had taken his place.

My shift was supposed to end at 9 p.m., but when I asked to leave, the manager, Jeff, shook his head.
“Not until the work is done,” he said. “You leave a clean station.” I was angry and thought about
quitting, but I scrubbed, rinsed and sanitized until after 10 that night.

I stayed on dish duty for weeks. My heart sank every time I arrived at work and saw my name written
next to “dishes” on the position chart. I spent my shifts behind those steel sinks, being splashed with
greasy water. After work, my red-and-white-checked button-up shirt and gray polyester pants smelled
like onions, olives and oil. At home, I sometimes found green peppers in my socks. I hated every minute I
spent on dish duty, and I wasn’t afraid to let everyone around me know it.

One slow midweek night, when I managed to catch up on dishes and clean out the sinks early, I asked
Jeff when I could do something different. “Do you know why you’re still doing dishes?” he asked.
“Because you keep complaining about it.” Nobody likes to work with a complainer, he said. But, he
promised, if I continued to leave a clean station and not complain, next week he would put me on the
“make table,” where pizzas were assembled before being put into the oven.

A few days later, when I reported for my after-school shift, I saw my name penciled not in the “dishes”
box but in the “make table” box. I was ecstatic.

Jeff had a special way of running his restaurant. From a crop of teenagers, he assembled a team of
employees who cared about their work — and one another. Most of my best friends from high school
also worked at Pizza Hut, and some of my best memories were made under that red roof.

Pizza Hut became not only my escape from home but also, in many ways, an alternate home. In my real
home, I felt unstable and out of control. At work, the path seemed clear: Work hard and do things right,
and you will succeed. This model had not seemed possible before.

For one of the first times in my life, I felt empowered. By the time I was in 11th grade, Jeff had promoted
me to shift manager. By my senior year, I was an assistant manager, responsible for much of the
bookkeeping, inventory and scheduling. I was in charge when Jeff was away.

Our staff was like a second family. We had all-day staff parties that started with rafting trips and ended
with dinner and movies. Most of us played on a softball team. We went camping together. We had
water fights in the parking lot and played music on the jukebox, turned up to full blast, after all the
customers had left.

Jeff was the leader of this unlikely family. He was about 15 years older than me and had recently gone
through a divorce. I never considered it at the time, because he seemed to be having as much fun as
everyone else, but if I was using my job to create the family I wish I’d had, it was possible that he was,
too.

Senior year arrived, and though I loved that job, I knew I would go to college the next fall. I was an A
student in class but probably about a C-minus in applying to schools. My mom hadn’t gone to college,
and I didn’t have a lot of logistical or financial support at home. I had received a pile of brochures from
colleges, but I didn’t know where to start — and, at $40, every application fee cost me half a day’s pay.

A guidance counselor persuaded me to apply to Boston University, which seemed great, primarily
because of its distance from Colorado. The scholarship application had to be in by the end of November
— and I was definitely not going there without a big scholarship. But maybe because of the fee or
because of my sheer cluelessness, I kept putting off the application.

I still had not mailed it the day before it was due. At work that day, I offhandedly mentioned to Jeff that
an application was due the next day but that I hadn’t mailed it. He opened a drawer and took out an
overnight envelope. He told me to stop what I was doing, leave work and send the application
immediately. I protested about the expense of overnight postage, but he said he would cover it.

I ended up getting into B.U., with a scholarship, but I still had never even visited Boston. Though my
mom worked hard to take care of my siblings and me, there just was no room in the budget to send me
on a college visit. So I figured I would just see the school when I got there in August.
Jeff surprised me with an early graduation present: a trip to Boston. He paid for the hotel, the car and
the plane tickets. We toured campus and visited Fenway Park and did some sightseeing around New
England. We ate at a lot of Pizza Huts, and we judged them against ours. The verdict: None of them
seemed to be very much fun.

Before I headed to college, I told Jeff that I would come back to work over winter break. While I was
away, he was promoted to regional manager, and a different person was put in charge of our store. I
went back anyway, and though I did my best to enjoy it, the magic was gone. The family had dispersed,
and I felt free to shift my mind-set to college and the future.

I have kept in touch with Jeff over the years. We usually meet for lunch when I’m in town. Sometimes
we even have pizza.

Washing dishes for Jeff was grueling, greasy work. But then again, making a pizza, or driving a truck, or
baking a cake, or any of countless other jobs are not always enjoyable in themselves, either. Out of all
the lessons I learned from that guy in the Pizza Hut tie, maybe the biggest is that any job can be the best
job if you have the right boss.
 Malunod man ngunit Makahahanap pa rin ng Isang Tahanan
ni Danial Adkison mula sa New York Times
Iba't ibang uri ng tao ang dumadating sa ating buhay upang maging sanhi ng pagbabago rito. May
nagsusulat sa pisara. Mayroon din namang nakasuot ng damit panlaro. 'Yung iba ay nakasuot ng polo at
kurbata. Sa aking buhay, dumating ang isang taong nakasuot ng kurbata na mayroong tatak ng Pizza Hut.

Nagsimula akong magtrabaho sa Pizza Hut noong Disyembre 1989, nang ako ay nasa unang taon ko sa
mataas na paaralan. Hinihikayat ng aking mga magulang ang kabataan sa aming maliit na bayan ng
Colorado na magtrabaho pagkatapos ng klase at tuwing Sabado't Linggo. Nakatulong naman ito upang
makaiwas kami sa gulo.

Dahil na rin sa aking trabaho, hindi ako madalas manatili sa aming bahay. Lumaki akong kasama ang
aking ina, at hindi ko kailanman nakilala ang tunay kong ama. Ilang amain din ang nakilala ko at ng aking
nakababatang kapatid na babae at lalaki. Madalas na hindi nagiging maayos ang relasyon ko sa aking
mga amain, at palagi akong humahanap ng mga rason upang tumakas sa ganoong sitwasyon.

Matanda na ang Pizza Hut na iyon, at sa likod nito ay mayroong tatlong malalaking lababo sa halip na
makinang panghugas. Mayroong dalawang palanggana -- isa para sa pagsasabon at isa para sa
pagbabanlaw na naging sanhi ng aking pag-uubo. Lahat ng bagong empleyado ay nagsisimula sa
paghuhugas ng mga pinggan at pagpupunas ng mga lamesa. Kapag mayroon nang napatunayan,
tinuturuan naman silang gumawa ng pizza, kung paano ito hiwain, ihain sa lamesang gawa sa kahoy, at
kung paano kumuha ng mga order.

Sa aking unang gabi, nagtambak ang mga plato pagkatapos ang hapunan: nariyan ang mga plato,
kutsara't tinidor, baso, at mauuling na mga kawali na malilinis lamang gamit ang maraming sabon at
mainit na tubig. Walang tigil ang pagdating ng mga panibagong hugasin at sa tuwing matatapos kong
hugasan ang isang talaksang plato, tatawagin naman ako para maglinis ng mga lamesa sa loob, at
babalik ako sa likod para lamang makita ang mas lalong dumami at mas lalong dumuming mga hugasin.

Sa aming bahay, sadyang hindi ko kinawiwilihan ang paghuhugas ng mga pinggan. Ilang taon na rin ang
nakalilipas, pinatanggal lang naman sa akin ng nobyo ng aking ina ang Teflon mula sa isang cookie sheet
sa pag-aakalang ito ay mantsa, habang siya ay prenteng-prenteng nakaupo sa sopa at naninigarilyo pa.
Nawala man siya sa aming buhay ngunit napalitan naman siya ng panibagong mga problema.

Ika-siyam ng gabi talaga ang tapos ko ngunit nang magpaalam ako sa aking tagapamahala na si G. Jeff,
hindi niya ako pinaalis hangga't hindi tapos ang trabaho. Nagalit ako at sumagi sa aking isip ang pag-alis
sa trabaho ngunit nakita ko na lamang ang aking sariling nagkukuskos, nagbabanlaw at naglilinis
hanggang sa ika-sampu ng gabing iyon.

Tumagal ako ng ilang linggo sa paghuhugas. Labis ang aking kalungkutan sa tuwing darating ako sa
trabaho at makikita ang pangalan kong katabi ng salitang "paghuhugas" sa talaan ng mga gawain. Inubos
ko oras ng aking mga pang-gabing duty sa mga metal na lababong iyon, natatalamsikan ng mamantikang
tubig. Pagkatapos ng trabaho, nangangamoy sibuyas, oliba at mantika ang aking pula at puting damit at
kulay abong pantalon. Ilang beses din akong nag-uwi ng berdeng paminta sa aking medyas.
Kinasusuklaman ko ang bawat minuto ng paghuhugas, at hindi ako natatakot na malaman ito ng bawat
tao sa aking paligid.

Isang mabagal na gabi sa kalagitnaan ng linggo, nang matapos ko nang maaga ang aking trabaho,
tinanong ko si G. Jeff kung kailan ako makagagawa ng ibang trabaho. "Alam mo ba kung bakit hanggang
ngayon ay naghuhugas ka pa rin ng pinggan?" tanong niya. "Dahil hanggang ngayon ay inirereklamo mo
pa rin ito." Ayon sa kanya, walang sinuman ang gustong makatrabaho ang isang taong mareklamo.
Ngunit kagaya ng kanyang ipinangako, kapag ipinagpatuloy ko ang aking trabaho nang walang natitirang
hugasin at hindi nagrereklamo, ilalagay na niya ako sa gawaan ng pizza, kung saan ang mga ito ay
inaayos bago ilagay so oven.

Matapos ang ilang araw, nang pumasok ako sa trabaho pagkatapos ng aking klase, nakita ko ang aking
pangalan, hindi na sa katabi ng salitang "paghuhugas", kundi sa tabi ng "gawaan ng pizza." Ako ay
nalugod.

Mayroong espesyal sa kung paano patakbuhin ni G. Jeff ang kanyang restawran. Mula sa inosenteng
grupo ng kabataan, nakagawa siya ng mga empleyadong may pagmamahal sa trabaho, at sa isa't isa.
Halos lahat ng kaibigan ko sa mataas na paaralan ay nagtrabaho sa Pizza Hut, at ilan sa pinakamaganda
kong mga alaala ay nangyari sa ilalim ng pulang bubong na iyon.

Pizza Hut. Hindi lamang ito nagsilbing takas palayo sa aming tahanan. Sa maraming paraan, tumayo rin
ito bilang aking pangalawang tahanan. Sa aming bahay, hindi ko alam kung bakit tila ba wala akong
kontrol at hindi ako mapakali. Ngunit ang lahat ng bagay ay tila nabibigyang-linaw sa tuwing ako ay nasa
trabaho. Magsikap at gawin ang tama upang magtagumpay. Parang kailan lang nang kasuklaman ko ang
paghuhugas ng pinggan.

Isa sa mga unang bagay na naranasan ko sa aking buhay ay ang makaramdam ng suporta. Nang ako ay
nasa ika-labing isang baitang na, inilagay ako ni G. Jeff sa pagiging shift manager. Sa huling taon ko sa
mataas na paaralan, isa na akong assistant manager na nangangasiwa ng imbentaryo at mga gawaing
pang-opisina. Ako rin ang namahala nang umalis sa G. Jeff.

Naging isang pamilya kami sa trabaho. Nagkaroon kami ng isang buong araw na kasiyahan na nagsimula
sa pagbabalsa at nagtapos sa hapunan at panonood ng mga pelikula. Halos lahat sa amin ay miyembro
ng softball team. Nagkamping kami, naglaro sa tubig, at nagpatugtog sa jukebox na pagkalakas-lakas
hanggang sa umalis na lahat ng kostomer.

Pinangunahan ni G. Jeff ang hindi ordinaryong pamilyang ito. Noon ay mas matanda siya sa akin ng halos
labinlimang taon at kagagaling lamang niya sa diborsyo. Hindi namin kailanman napansin iyon sapagkat
lagi siyang mukhang masaya katulad ng bawat isa sa amin. Ngunit kung ginagamit ko ang aking trabaho
upang magkaroon ng pamilyang pinapangarap ko, marahil ay siya rin.
Lumipas ang huling taon at kahit mahal na mahal ko ang trabahong iyon, alam kong kailangan kong mag-
aral ng kolehiyo sa susunod na panahon ng taglagas. Nangunguna ako sa aking klase na mayroong mga
markang A ngunit tila ba isa akong C-minus sa paghahanap ng unibersidad. Hindi nakapagkolehiyo ang
aking ina kaya naman wala akong matanggap na payo at suportang pinansiyal mula sa kanya. Mayroon
akong mga brochure mula sa mga unibersidad ngunit hindi ko alam kung paano at saan magsisimula -- at
sa bawat subok ko ay nagbabayad ako ng $40 na kalahati ng aking isang araw na sweldo.

Isang gabay tagapayo ang nanghikayat sa akin na mag-apply sa Unibersidad ng Boston na naisip kong
isang magandang ideya dahil sa malayong distansiya nito mula sa Colorado. Ang pag-aaply para sa
scholarship ay hanggang sa buwan ng Nobyembre -- at hindi naman ako pupunta roon kung walang
magandang oportunidad. Ngunit siguro dahil na rin sa laki ng gastos o sa simpleng pagiging inosente ko,
hindi ko ito maituloy-tuloy.

Hindi ko inayos ang aking mga papeles hanggang dumating ang araw bago ang huling araw ng
aplikasyon. Sinabi ko kay G. Jeff sa trabaho noong araw na iyon na huling araw na bukas ngunit hindi pa
rin ako nag-aasikaso. Binuksan niya ang tukador at naglabas ng isang kulay-kapeng sobre. Sinabihan niya
akong itigil ang aking ginagawa, umalis sa trabaho at asikasuhin agad ang aplikasyon. Hindi ko agad
tinanggap ang laman ng sobre ngunit sinabi niyang siya ang bahala.

Nakapasok ako sa BU nang may scholarship ngunit hindi pa rin ako nakakapunta sa Boston. Gaano man
naghihirap ang aming ina upang kami ay alagaan at tustusan, hindi iyon sapat para sa pagbisita sa aking
magiging paaralan. Makikita ko siguro ang unibersidad kapag lumipat na ako roon sa Agosto.

Ikinagulat ko ang maagang regalo ni G. Jeff sa akin para sa aking pagtatapos: isang pasyal at biyahe
papuntang Boston. Siya ang nagbayad para sa aming tutuluyan, sasakyan at bayad sa eroplano.
Namasyal kami sa unibersidad, pumunta sa Fenway Park at nagmasid sa paligid ng New England. Kumain
kami ng maraming-maraming Pizza Huts, hinusgahan at ikinumpara ang mga ito sa amin. Ang hatol: wala
ni isa sa mga ito ang nakaangat sa aming Pizza Hut.

Bago ako magkolehiyo, sinabi ko kay G. Jeff na babalik ako para magtrabaho sa panahon ng taglamig.
Nang ako ay wala, siya ay napromote bilang isang regional manager at ibang tao na ang namahala sa
aming restawran. Bumalik pa rin ako; ginawa ko na ang aking buong makakaya upang magsaya ngunit
nawala na ang mahika. Ang pamilyang aming binuo ay nagkawatak-watak na at naramdaman kong mas
kailangan kong pagtuunan ng pansin ang kolehiyo at ang aking kinabukasan.

Nanatili ang komunikasyon ko kay G. Jeff hanggang sa susunod na mga taon. Madalas kaming magkita at
kumain sa bayan. Nagpi-pizza pa nga kami kung minsan.

Ang paghuhugas ng pinggan, para kay G. Jeff, ay isang mamantika at nakapanghihinang trabaho. Ngunit
ang paggawa ng pizza, o ang pagmamaneho ng trak, o ang paggawa ng keyk, o ang kahit na ano pa mang
trabaho ay hindi rin naman madali. Sa lahat ng bagay na natutunan ko mula sa lalaking nakasuot ng
kurbatang pang-Pizza Hut, marahil ang pinakatumatak sa akin ay: Ang anumang trabaho ay maaaring
maging pinakamagandang trabaho kung mayroon kang makatuwirang amo.