My Mom knows a LOVE STORY

It is a quiet Saturday afternoon inside our house today. I am reading, my siblings are attending to their digital concerns, my mom is ironing our clothes while our neighbor is playing 96.3 Easy Rock FM on loud speakers.

I have to go to inside a room because while the music is good, it distracts me from reading a (nonetheless) self-help book. With the unexpected playing of some songs, my mom quips, "bata pa ako nung sumikat yang kantang 'yan," and "alam mo pinanuod pa namin ni Papa mo sa sine yung pelikula niyan, yang yung theme song. Sa Cubao pa yun e." 

Each of us continues with our different worlds until my mother felt nostalgic in one song: Endless Love, a duet by Diana Ross and Lionel Richie. She starts recalling...

(not in her exact words)

Alam niyo mayroon akong kaklase noong first year college
Bata pa lang siya, sila na nung boyfriend niya noon. Mag-first love sila. First boyfriend na yun
Tapos 'yan yung theme song nila. Tuwing tumutugtog yan, kumakanta sila, sumasayaw sila
Lahat kami kinikilig. Ang sweet sweet nila
Tapos isang araw, yung boyfriend niya, nagpunta ng Navotas sa bahay nila
Nahold-up, eh nanlaban yata, napatay
Tapos yung kaklase ko, sobrang nalungkot siya na umabot sa hindi na siya nakapag-aral
Gabi-gabi nandun kami sa burol ng boyfriend niya. Iyak kami nang iyak kasi iyak siya ng iyak
Facetowel ang dadalhin mo dahil hagulgol ka sa kanya
Tapos araw-araw hinahanap namin siya, hindi siya makita sa bahay nila
Nandun pala siya sa sementeryo, sa puntod ng boyfriend niya
Minsan dinadala na lang namin siya ng pagkain

Tuwing naririnig ko yung kantang yan, yung kaklase kong yun yung naaalala ko
Asan na kaya yun. Hindi ko nga alam kung nakapagtapos ng pag-aaral yun
Ang alam ko nag-aral siya after ng ilang taon. Pinilit na lang yata siya ng pamilya niya nun
Pero siya ayaw niya na talaga
Sabi lumipat na daw sila sa Cavite
Hindi ko rin alam kung nakapang-asawa pa siya
Ano na kaya nangyari doon

Kaya tuwing naririnig ko talaga yang kantang yan, yung Endless Love
Hindi ko mapigilang maiyak
Naaalala ko sila, ang sweet sweet nila
Tapos namatay yung lalaki. Kawawa naman yung kaklase ko.
Hindi ko talaga mapigilang umiyak tuwing naririnig ko yung kantang yan



My mother grabbed me and my sister's attention with her monologue. She occasionally stopped from ironing and wiped her tears with a towel. 

We can't help but think of where is that woman now? That girlfriend who still went to the cemetery everyday after her boyfriend's interment. That young lady who traded her studies to experience the pain and chose to live with it. She must be one blessed woman right now because of her guardian angel. A man so young, promising, loyal and sweet who looks up to her from heaven thinking, "I'm so sorry to leave early. But I thank God for your loyalty."

To the people reading this, if you cannot recall the lyrics of Endless Love, you need not Google it anymore. The way my mother recounted that love story is better than singing the song entirely.

Wow. What a way to spend Saturday afternoon. 

It's way past 5 P.M. now. I am done reading the book, my mother is also done with the ironing while our neighbor has turned off the radio. Within minutes, another story was born and I could not have been happier.