Chapter 3
1197 Words
Today.
Today is a big day in a big city for a big dreamer like Miss Emma Pineda, the professoress. Ma’am Emma, as Aaron the Third addressed her. Some Senior studes (and studs), however, liked to call her Mama Emma.
With the smoke of the New Year’s eve celebration finally settled and the debris of the fireworks finally swept by the cold return of the northernly monsoon winds at dawn, the early riser that she is, Mama Emma has at thirteen minutes past four in the morning felt her novelette finally completed.
Well, not really a novelette. But a journal. Her journal. Her life’s notes for the past year. Her posts from the past. No, not in her social media account, but in an ordinary pocket notebook: the small keeper of her big dream. Not that she has any “literary” aspiration of publishing her notes as a single novelette. Goodness, no. Her set of journals merely recorded her own life’s spiritual journey for each past year, of finding her rhythm in the “creation of things,” of finding herself again. She has always believed that inside every person’s heart, there is this need to “break the routine” and make the heart and mind leap from themselves – even exchange places once in a while – in order to view things in a rather strange but certainly more exciting and adventurous way.
At thirteen minutes past four in the morning, she feels her own circadian rhythm trying to pursue its habit of caffeine and crackers, yet she chooses instead to forego the needs of her body and to heed instead the incessant shout-outs of her own imagination. To Miss Emma, over and above any empirical observation that life readily reveals to her in all its practicalities and through the commonest of all senses, there is still that unexplainable something which makes the itching of her palms or the sneezing through her nose during a rainstorm vaguely more important than any other priority course of action she has to perform at that particular moment and place in time. Call it superstition, intuition, gut instinct, but it works for her. Even the very idea of magic and words being twin manifestations of one and the same thing intrigues her to no end; particularly when it comes to the subjects dear to her, like the search for true love, for happiness, and for things way past personal.
One time, after hearing stories from her apartment neighbors, she ventured to visit Quiapo, near the church, to look for Madam Valencia, which her neighbors testified was an authentic tarot cards reader and a good witch. And it was for the simple reason that she wanted to know what would become of her love life in the big city. For a hundred pesos, the good Madam closed her overly lined eyes and bowed a head which supposedly bore a human face somewhere underneath that thick pile of curled hair streaked with freaky tints and ribbonettes. Once a popular lovecaster of movie stars and yuppie-and-yummy politicians, the good Madam and her haunt were after exhaustive effort discovered by Miss Emma from among the overcrowded deal of charms stalls and makeshift tarot tables which sprouted close to the curb of an infamous pre-war edifice an amulet’s throw away from the historic Quiapo church. Here, it might be speculated that a big dreamer like Miss Emma would try to see whatever future and fortune awaited her, with the help of magic, other forms of divination, and, of course, with words. Would she ever get to meet her true love in her lifetime? What would the infamous tarot cards reader make of her new career path as a teacher in the big city? What does the future hold for Miss Emma, Madam Valencia?
Perhaps, it was because of being a foundling that Mama Emma had grown to be more inclined to the romantic notions early in life; that each and every thing in this world could never be an artefact of any accident, but an important piece in the grand design of fate. Albeit the idea was generally baseless, even un-scientific, the girl inside the heart of the good lady’s imagination had always believed in the most impossible things in life. Like discovering who her biological parents really were, or the concepts of true love, forever, and of happily living ever after. And being a big dreamer in a big city on a big day such as today, Mama Emma opens one last time her pocket notebook – being particularly extra-special this year – to check and see if the folded piece of paper bequeathed to her by the good witch is still safely tucked in between the pages of her journal.
She remembers that day well when Madam Valencia handed her the folded piece of paper with a firm yet motherly reminder. “Never, never unfold the oraciones, child! At least, not for the flimsiest of excuses to do so! For you must guard it with your soul, through life and death! Through life and death!”
Miss Emma even remembers the last words Madam Valencia called out to her as she finally stood to leave. “Today is a picture of tomorrow taken yesterday.”
Today is a picture of tomorrow taken yesterday.
*
Yesterday – and for every day thereafter, Sir Raymond Damasco had seen the beggar near the gates of the school from 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
The summarily confused school principal distinctly remembered asking the burly security guard to take care of this, since it would cast the reputation of an academic institution such as theirs to be a safe haven for the homeless and the sick.
“We are not the Hospicio de San Jose, Mang Ramon, or a home for the aged! We are in the business of molding young minds into veritable portals for the great discoveries of this world; nay, even the entire universe if necessary! So please take care of this, or I will be forced to act according to what logic dictates!”
Yesterday – and for every school day thereafter, Mang Ramon had never been a person of violent – and even violative – force. Early on in his life as a member of a family with modest means, Mang Ramon has great respect for the dignity of life, particularly those who have the least, those who seem lost, and those who are considered the last, in this world all of humanity considers as home.
Once, Mang Ramon tried to engage with the beggar, though old and with hair disheveled, yet possessing a strange kind of rare demeanor which could be seen only in more noble circles.
That one time, the old beggar lifted his head and looked at Mang Ramon straight in the eye, and with an unusual lilt in the voice of the wayfarer, evoked the words which would change the life of a young boy named Aaron the 3rd.
“Today is a picture of tomorrow taken yesterday.”
- Writer
