The Day after 2005

I was hurting in four places when I woke up morning of January 1. I had to chew two tablets of antacid to keep my stomach from rejecting anything I put in. And the first thing I did after greeting my mother and kasambahays happy new year was to check my last night's barong for holes, scratches, and dirt.

There was none. Not even a tiny speck.

And yet the bodily pains slowly grew distinct until I was able to count not four but five points that felt like they got stabbed by a blunt object. Right shoulder, right elbow, the back of my right palm, right thigh, and right shin.

Over breakfast my mother kept making me turn around to search for any sign of wound or bruising. There was none. Save for the gash in my right palm I got the other day for twisting a bottle cap that got jammed, I have no visible injury, even on the points where the flesh hurt when applied light pressure.

I remember staying sober last night until I fulfilled my duty of dancing with my mother in the grand "Rigodon de Honor", which was the highlight of the town's annual Father's Day/New Year celebration.

It was after the grand square dance that I started consuming everything friends, waiters, elder folks, handed me -- red wine, white wine, beer, tequilla, etc etc.

An hour before midnight I was laughing at everything. I laughed with folks who kept asking me how come I'm not marrying so-and-so because we look so good together, and later laughed with so-and-so when I told her what the folks have been telling me. Some folks thought I already got married, while majority got the date correct.

Good old small town publicity... news do spread fast.

Thirty minutes before midnight I left my mother to say hello to my elementary school friends gathered in a house not far from the town hall. More beer.

At the strike of midnight, I rode the motorbike and made my way back to the hall, weaving past street dancers and people staring skywards to watch the fireworks.

What happened next was a blur.

The bike's front wheel hit a coco-lumber sprawled diagonally on the unlighted part of the street. The bike slid sideways as I tried to support my weight with my right leg, and came to stop with me lying on my right side.

I was up and gunning the bike's engine by the time one of my friends caught up. A quick scan of my appearance and he slapped my back, greeted my happy new year, and sent me off.

By the time I got to the hall, a text message from my mother told me that she already went home. At home, we sang videoke and drank some more for another two hours before everyone finally went to sleep.

How my barong stayed unscathed remained a mystery, and was momentarily forgotten after breakfast. Maybe I imagined the whole bike incident...

It was morning of January 2, as my mother and her driver were about to leave for office, when they made another discovery on the bike. It made my mother run upstairs to my room and wake me from my slumber.

The rear part of the bike's seat was smeared in blood, with bloody handprints all over it.

Definitely human blood, says the driver as he wiped it off with a wet rag before I could say "stop-let-me-take-a-picture-of-it-first!"

Sigh. I hate it when I forget things.

Happy 2006!

With my mother after the festivities, and the barong that somehow defied explanation. ^^