Written 26 July 2011

This is a response to J.'s e-mail, in which she asks, "Let's say in the future Science discovers that you can only remember so many things, and you need to let go of stuff in order to take in more. Let's call it voluntary amnesia. What are five memories you will never let go?"

An edited version of my answer --

• Sitting in the car with Papa, popping bubble wrap while singing at the top of our lungs to Free Movement. It was the afternoon; we were waiting for Mama. She was outside waiting in line at an ATM. We were bored. I forget why I had the bubble wrap. I forget the year when this happened. I think I was still in college. I was in the passenger seat. That moment lasted for three and half minutes. The song was I Found Somebody New, one of his favourites. It's the closest I will ever get to storge. I need to remember this so that if ever life is kinder and would allow me to have a child, I will have at least a shade of an idea how to be a parent. I am certain I will get almost everything wrong, but I will create hundreds of moments like these to make up for it.
• A. reading Alain de Botton's On Love to me one night. It was after midnight. He just came home from work. I was about to sleep. He called to say good night. We ended up talking until the wee hours. It was one of those rare phone calls that changes your life (I've only received two; one was in 2009 when the hospital called to tell me that Lolo was having a cardiac arrest). We talked about a lot of things (as we always do), but the part that stood out was when he took this book down from his shelf and read to me. It was his father's book; it became his when his dad left for Switzerland. I was reading to him excerpts from Nikki Gemmell's The Bride Stripped Bare, and because we were going down that road, he read this book to me. I'll always remember him with a fondness, I guess, even if it ended the way it did. That night it felt so good to be loved. I want to keep this memory as a reminder to myself that I was young once. And love can make you feel like that.
• A cab ride on my way to work one night, listening to the soundtrack of Amelie. It was 2007, I was a few months in. I was still doing the night shift. I was discovering a new way to work. There was no traffic. The rain was light. The cab weaved its way in and out of backstreets, avenues, bridges. I felt like I was floating. There was a lot of shit in my mind, but during that ride I felt the pieces of myself slowly falling back into place. Everything suddenly fit. I was almost whole. The experience was...ethereal. I still think about it from time to time. Especially when I feel like jumping over a cliff. Or sleeping and never waking up again. That night, I felt like I could do this, you know? This being human thing. So that would be something nice to remember.
• Walking in the dark, in the middle of the flooded highway, from Cubao to Tomas Morato. September 25, 2009. It was the day Ondoy hit Manila. I just came from a date with a man I hardly know. I lied to everybody else and said I was at a meeting. The journey back home was something I would never forget. I was soaking wet, the flood was up to my ankles, then my knees, then my thighs, then down to my ankles again. I can't see where I'm going. I don't even want to think about what's in the water. I don't care if I stepped on shit, rat's piss, garbage or whatnot. Just please don't let me fall down an open manhole. It was like an exodus out there. I have never been so full of panic and despair and general what-the-fuck-ness of the world. But I made it. I walked that damn line and I made it. And if I didn't, many things in my life right now wouldn't have happened. You would think that I like this memory because it a reminder of what I've been through and how strong I've become. Well, yeah. But it's more of - this is an example of an instance in my life where I just had to be there so that other things in my life would happen later on. I can't explain it very well. It's as if I am compelled to consciously choose one path from the other, and this choice have set things in motion. Plus it makes for a very good story. Heh.
• November 9, 2009, around noon at St. Luke's Hospital. I was standing at the hallway in the lobby of St. Luke's with Papa and Mommy Lola. We were waiting for the elevator. We just rushed to the hospital because I got a phone call from the nurse at the ICU that Lolo just had his fourth cardiac arrest. We arrived in a taxi because we were afraid Papa was too distraught to drive. Prior to this, Papa and I were playing Bejeweled in his room. We haven't had a lot of sleep. Mama and Sacha went to Divisoria. I can't explain what I was feeling. I mean, it was the fourth cardiac arrest. Should I even expect for anything? We were waiting at the elevator. It was taking a while - as if St. Luke's had 20 floors. Then -- this little white butterfly suddenly appeared out of nowhere. It was peculiar because in all the years I've been inside the hospital I've never seen an insect there. Then there's this butterfly. It's tiny. It fluttered above my head. Then it decided to rest near the elevator door. I stared at it for a long time (the elevator was late). At that moment I knew. We got to the ICU. The nurse were vigorously pumping Lolo's chest. It was one of the most painful things I've ever seen in my life. Papa couldn't take it anymore so he decided to stop them. We watched the monitor; Lolo's heartbeat was so faint. Papa asked the nurse, "How long does he have?" The nurse said, "Oh, it won't take long," and the moment she said that -- flatline. It was horrible. It was as if everything was in slow motion. I kept thinking about that butterfly. For me it's proof that there's a force at work that I have yet to understand. It's very humbling. Everything I know, everything I believe in, leads to that butterfly. It tells me that death is both sad and beautiful. It tells me that this life is not the only life we have. It tells me that it is possible to know what's beyond that door, that when I step inside the elevator, ultimately I know what will happen, and where I will be going. It tells me that even if that is so, who I am, whatever is inside me that makes me me, will still choose to move forward, no matter how scared shitless I am. And that is a memory worth keeping. If my life was a coming-of-age novel, it will all be focused on this moment.

These memories - this is the first time I really sat down to write about them. So I guess it's been a long time coming. Thank you, J.