MI BODA

MI BODA
12" X 15"
acrylic on canvas

“Did you have one of those gunshot weddings? Or was it a sort of “love-at-first-sight” thing?”

“I knew I shouldn’t have let you watch too many of those old movies in the afternoons when you were a child. Now you have too many romantic notions.”

“Mamu, I’m your son. I should know how you guys ended up with each other.”

And that’s how it was my own mother would respond to my questions every time I’d ask her how she and my father became a couple… until one day, at dinner, she told me her story.

“…I was 19 when I came from Passi knowing nothing of the outside world. I also had nothing except a small bag with a few clothes and the best Sunday dress I had. I first stayed with your aunt – my older sister who worked near the American base in Clark in a club called Bubbles.

Your aunt was pretty back then but she also had a temper. It was that temper that didn’t make me get along with her.

One day we had a big argument. I ran away to Manila. Here in the city, I went to female friend of mine who was living in the dorm. But she couldn’t have me stay in her room – it was incredibly cramped and told me that she had another friend who had a bigger space in the campus. That friend of hers was your father.”

“So, you shacked up with him? A barrio lass in the room of a city boy?”

“Yes. The next day your father proposed that we get married. He said that no decent girl would stay in the room of a boy if they’re not married.

…and we’ve stayed married for the past 48 years.”

“Mamu, 2 years from now, you and Tatay are officially an old couple.”