Sunday, December 17, 2006 Estremera: Let's have fun By Stella A. Estremera Spider's Web
WHILE waiting for a friend to imbibe our once a week nightcap of wine in this bar we frequent, a group of young ones -- definitely college kids -- seemed to have started earlier than us.
Since it was still not 8 p.m., there was more reason to frown at them not because they're young, but because...
There were three boys and two girls. One girl was ordinary looking and kept her voice very low, hushing and shushing. The boys were your typical college boys -- nice looking but with the hint of the predator in their eyes, waiting for one helpless lass to fall willingly in their arms. And on that night, one helpless lass looked about ready to fall, that was if she didn't outshout herself.
She was the pretty one. Morena, with a bit of flesh but just a teeny-weeny bit. Meaning, she's not like the sticks we have sashaying around as girls these days. She'd stand out in a crowd: pretty face, doleful eyes, and... very loud mouth.
The few other early patrons were giving furtive glances at the group as the loudmouthed girl growled and yakked in a gross caricature of a drunk. "Kaya ko pa lagi, hindi pa lagi ako lassheeeeng!!!"
The lines she was uttering in a decibel that could drown out the background music was so cliché, it was darn irritating.
The other girl was obviously so embarrassed by the wild display, she would try to shush her friend and sneakily move the glass of beer further away, apparently hoping her friend would forget to take a sip if it's not within reach. The two other guys were as sympathetic. But not the third guy, the greater predator of the three, who (once the girl noticed that her glass is no longer in front of her and she'd make a grab for it again) would pour more beer in.
I don't know how that night ended. After all I was just a spectator. I just hope the sober girl was wise enough to bring her drunk friend home herself. But with college kids, we can never be sure... Wisdom, after all, comes at hindsight.
With all those Christmas parties coming one after another, with drinks pouring and just about every bar enticing everyone to celebrate the season with drinks and more drinks, discretion remains to be the better part of valor but not so many of us have that discretion nor care about valor.
Christmas, the season for rejoicing and with good reason too. In fact, it's Christiandom's best reason to celebrate. Make that Filipino Christiandom and we have a whole season celebration with Christmas parties starting as early as the first week of December. Oh gee.
Ours, in fact, has long been over while several others had to be turned down because it coincided with ours.
Parties, they're one big reason to let loose and... get drunk in the process. I wonder how many "should'ves and could'ves" have been uttered after such intoxicating gathering. That is for the conscienced ones of course. The unevolved among us would never be able to distinguish an ass from an asshole. Worse, the unevolved will never realize that he is one and has the other.
There's a lot of reason for caution, especially because Christmas parties for us who have long shed off their school uniforms, are usually work-related. A bit tipsy on the side would make parties fun all right, but rowdy and uncontrollable is... don't even think about it.
