“Childhood memories were like airplane luggage; no matter how far you were traveling or how long you needed them to last, you were only ever allowed two bags. And while those bags might hold a few hazy recollections — a diner with a jukebox at the table, being pushed on a swing set, the way it felt to be picked up and spun around — it didn’t seem enough to last a whole lifetime.”
~ Jennifer E. Smith, This is What Happy Looks Like
Project: Live
12 Sitio Centro was rather quiet - a very unusual feel now that all Tres Marias have gone to the heavens - as we visited Sta. Catalina for this year's Holy Week.
Gone are the days where we would catch Inang Benit sitting alone on the bamboo bench in its front porch, with her left leg and arm stretched straight, the other leg folded where she would rest her right arm and vaguely gaze at the neighborhood.
In its backyard we would often see the hunchbacked Inang Consing cooking meals for them two... The whiffs of them so inviting and mouth-watering they were hard to resist.
We didn't have the chance to meet Inang Baak. She passed away before we were born.
12 Sitio Centro used to be our home in Sta. Catalina every visiting days. It was our hugest playground, with real playmates whose names I can't recall - something we were deprived at in La Union.
It was the absolute place of my carefree childhood memories.
This home would be filled with all kinds of happy - the second floor room with my and Kris' petty quarells and squeaky giggles, the cemented front yard with neighboring kids playing shatong, tumbang preso, baka-baka, piko, and all other outdoor games technology nowadays have overtook, the backyard where grapevines used to be our shield from the scorching sun's heat, where everyone would gather round for a meal or two with Kris and I sitting on wooden stool-like high chairs and where I would pick little red mansanitas and peach gumamela flowers to cook in my cute claypot toys, and Inang's taltalon where we would make paper or leaf boats and have them sailed away while Inang Consing watered her cauliflower or cabbage or onion plants.
12 Sitio Centro was rather quiet and empty while approaching it as I pushed a bicycle to practice to on its cemented pathway. Not for long...
The cousins followed to teach me and Kris how to ride the bike. It was nostalgic, like carefree childhood memories played on replay. For a moment there, 12 Sitio Centro was again filled with a different kind of happy the adult life does not offer.
I'd pay a cent or two to have this played again.
Comments
Post a Comment