Tuesday, April 08, 2008 Malilong: Love in Tubigon By Frank Malilong The Other Side
IT was a love scene reminiscent of the river boat ride of Florentino and Fermina in Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s “Love in the Time of Cholera.”
There on a boulder protruding from the receding waters by the pier in Tubigon last Saturday sat a couple on a picnic. It was late morning and the sun was particularly oppressive but from the look in their faces, they could have been dining in candle light with roses on the table and an orchestra playing a serenade.
Of course, there were no roses. They ate with their hands, not with silverware, from a plastic bag instead of from the finest china; instead of red wine, they had tuba poured from a Coke litro bottle. And if they heard music, it did not come from an orchestra but from the sheer joy of each other’s presence.
Indeed, they were completely oblivious to anything but their presence. If they noticed our curious eyes, they didn’t allow it to intrude into their privacy.
I felt the sting from the stab of jealousy as I looked at them. How could they enjoy such serenity in the midst of all the distractions? How could they sit there, unmindful of the sun and skin cancer, not worrying about deadlines nor fidgeting over unpaid mortgages nor chafing over life’s bad deals?
They couldn’t have been younger than 65 but they obviously haven’t lost their verve to the years. She actually looked younger even with her glasses still on as she floated on her back in the murky sea than when I saw her for the first time with her man. He had little difficulty climbing off the water to a trisikad parked by the side of the pier. He must have driven it himself, the carriage that took him and his lover to their tryst.
How do I love thee? I don’t think the couple even heard of Elizabeth Barrett Browning and even if they did, I doubt if they took the trouble to count the ways. But during that fleeting moment that I watched them, there was no mistaking that they did/do love each other “with the passion put to use in (their) old griefs, and with (their) childhood’s faith.”
I didn’t quite fathom the amused look in our host Edgar Labella’s face while we craned our necks towards the rock where the couple sat. Then I remembered the ditty:
Kon ikaw inday mangitag pamanhonon
Seguroha baya gayod ang Bol-anon.
Kon matuman mo, swerte ka
Kay ang Bol-anon buotan gayod.
Magmahal kanimo hangtod
Sa kahangtoran.
