Intimations

Sometime last week, I completed six cycles of the Year of the Cock, begun on the day — as a Bedan buddy based in Connecticut had researched and announced to both our email and Viber loops — that the Americans re-entered Manila to take it back from the Japanese.

Hey, that was a long time ago. Makes me ancient, or uber-vintage, though with my cock-eyed optimism I still talk trash with the rest of the Bedan fools who believe they have the best chance of winning our LMS prize. That’s for Last Man Standing, with the final survivor of our H.S. Class of 1960 left to enjoy whatever collective loot we had padded up till that point.

That point. When with only two of us left, one hears the other had gone, leaving him the Last Man Standing, the sole heir to wherewithal.

I had proposed that this LMS prize be immediately awarded when two guys remained, so they could at least party together. Being left with the entire bag with no one to toast a glass to survivalist luck wouldn’t be quite the same.

But I guess there’s a primacy factor coating the LMS Prize, as in it doesn’t need to add another letter in its acronym to stand for Last Two Men Standing. My proposal was thus ignored. Now everyone else will have to contend with me in this contest of longevity.

In my teens I enjoyed the 1947 bestselling novel Knock on Any Door by Willard Motley — which was turned into a 1949 film with Humphrey Bogart and the young John Derek, who played the central character Nick Romano. His celebrated motto was “Live fast, die young, and have a good-looking corpse.”

Idolatrous at that age, I said to myself that’s how I should go, too — at which point magical extenders like cigarettes and liquor made a case for themselves. And life went on, fast but no dying.

Later, I said I’d be content to reach the turn of the milennium. That’d take me up to 55. And subsequently, when fully orphaned in the year 2000, the data offered that dad had gone at 62 while mom had reached 78. So I kinda figured that despite all the vitamins and maintenance pills served these days on the road to longevity, it would be fair to expire at a median age, like 70.   

Now I’ve lapped the oval two more turns beyond, thus far. Even with no serious health issues despite my continued smoking,  I’m still aware that I could go anytime, and lose out on the LMS Prize.

A certain sadness engulfs me now and then, even as I bathe in the sun on mid-mornings, a first cup of coffee greeting the new day while I enjoy a garden’s evolution. I still want to see my second grandkid, a granddaughter, finish college. I have plans to write at least a couple more novels, and some more poetry. And finish up more bottles of single malt whisky, and party a bit more, feed on excellent lechon, loll about on more beaches.

I know I’ve been somewhat fortunate to have lived a lush life up to this point, with continuing prospects of stretching it for several more years. But in moments of realistic assessment, some concerns confront this imminent voyager now said to be in the pre-departure lounge.

I won’t be leaving my kids any properties or other assets, only a lot of books and artworks. The latter, I took individual photos of some months ago, intending to compose an album file that would list down provenance, the artists’ names, titles, possible value.

One of these days I’ll turn over that file to my daughter, and tell her she and her brothers would be free to dispose of these artworks as they see fit, when I go. After all, there’ll be necessary downsizing on their part, and each one is likely to go her-his way, without the privilege of setting up a family museum.

Regarding all the books, I will sinply identify those I had authored or had a hand in, including all the anthologies where some work of mine is represented. All of these that presently occupy a particular book shelf, they can keep, if they want to share in the preservation of positive memory. But I don’t imagine that they can do the same with the rest of the book shelves, which will take up so much space.

Worse, a myriad of filing cabinets, actual chests and countless boxes are filled with literary and personal papers, correspondence, sets of photos, posters of literary and cultural events of the past five decades, memorabilia of a full life. I imagine having my kids offer them, or maybe I should, soon, to some university library willing to house them permanently.   

Of course one would want to leave as little mess as possible for others, even loved ones, to sort out. Clean getaways are always part of desiderata.

My largest regret for now is that I might not outlive the impasse that has befallen our country. I don’t think too many in our generation ever thought that we’d still have to go through this, again, nor imagined that our kids would. We had already thrown out a dictator over three decades ago. We didn’t really expect it to turn downhill from that point, but neither did we anticipate that after five presidents, no matter how each did in their turns at leading our country, the next to serve in the same capacity would so polarize us. 

Whatever biases and leanings we may have had, the least criticism that can be leveled at the current leadership is the extreme polarization it has caused, and continues to exacerbate.

Even as I write this, a political drama is being played out before the weekend. It doesn’t help that even without this dramatic development, some quarters had already raised the specter of a ghost: an alleged plot to topple the administration.

We’re all aware of the strong sentiments it continues to provoke, despite an apparent general apathy inclusive of fear or lassitude. At some point it’ll all come to a head. Will everything that is being claimed to be positive change being effected really overwhelm the memory of over 7,000 slain over what could have simply been used, and is still being used, as a bogey?

By today, the weekend just past would also have been played out as a confrontational show of force between oppositionists and supporters, with the latter appearing to have the upper hand in their organization of greater numbers and multiple-city rallies. There is said to be a planned move where these supporters will present a people’s manifesto proposing that the President declare a revolutionary government.

Oh my. All the bogeys employed appear to lead to an enforced climax born of ghost scenarios. In my old age, I lament this development, and worry why my kids would now have to be embroiled in such a face-off. Of course I can also continue to hope that I manage to stay on to welcome a resolution. At this point, it looks like only a comeuppance can prove gratifying.

Ah, come on, Time, fly by.