Water

It was late afternoon yesterday when the wife had hollered from the kitchen on what we’re supposed to eat for dinner. I was at the computer vehemently doing something at that moment that I just told her succinctly—-nearly shouting at the top of my voice—-that we’d just better buy some fish available just across the street and have them fried or open up some canned goods if there was any. I was in a state that I wouldn’t care anymore about what I am about to gobble up since there was just a bounty of food over the weekend, Friday being Fiesta Pilar where Evelyn (the wife) had prepared some special food, like pancit (I wonder why there should always be pancit on special occasions) and a horde of fruit salads—-hordes because my Mom bought more canned fruit salads when she had arrived and everyone here seem to adore fruit salads that we keep on eating it even till the day after. And on Saturday, me and the kids were at my Uncle Mameng’s house for the Eid’l Ftir celebration and lots of very special, spicy food over there, like chicken curries and this black beef soup known simply as tiulah itum (black soup).

And mind you the city mayor was also there as Uncle Mameng works for him at the City Hall as an adviser and it’s probably the only time of the year where Mayor Celso Lobregat would alight from his government-provided service vehicle and walk-in just like any ordinary invitees, with no armed bodyguards at that, and with just a few companion, including a city councilor who is a fraternity brod of mine.

So where was I? Oh, about the wife asking what food we’re going to eat on that sleepy twilight yesterday and the kids suddenly went rambunctious and demanded that we’d have fried chicken for the evening table. That means I would have to drive a couple of kilometer to score that damn whole fried chicken. So off I went with my white, compact, fuel-efficient, and ultra-fast (at least that’s what I’d like to believe it to be) KIA Pride, albeit it’s so small like a kid’s car and the paint on it is fading fast, fading like a flower as one song goes.

After buying the whole fried chicken that the children wanted so badly that night, I felt like I couldn’t take another morsel of special food (like fried chicken) into my tummy. I thought I’d buy fish and hovered lazily towards Puericulture Center at the heart of downtown, where it remains alive as a food center deep into the evening, where hordes of people were trotting to and fro, eating and buying cooked food, while some were gorging on beer and singing along upon Karaokes, making the whole place a lot noisier than what it was already, probably singing away some loneliness or heartbreak.

I felt a little unusual that it took me nearly an hour just to buy fastfood downtown even while the road was almost free of traffic at that time. I arrived home feeling a little tired even when I had thought that I shouldn’t have been, for all I did was line-up for a fried chicken and waited for the chicken barbecue to be fully cooked at Puericulture (I had decided by the way against buying roasted fish as I had a sudden fancy for the spicy hot chicken that had made that place so popular in this town).

And I felt so thirsty upon arriving home and went straight towards the refrigerator and downed every amount of water in a pitcher. I was so glad and thankful for water at that time. I felt so very thirsty that I was so grateful that water is free (or almost free) and I didn’t had to shell out a single centavo for that.

Aren’t we all glad that water is free (or almost free)? All the special foods and all I wanted at that very moment were ice-cold water, and I felt so darnly that it was what all I ever needed at that time. Reminded me for certain how this often-quoted anonymous guy had once said that the best things in life are free. Fried chicken? Black beef soup? Pancit? Fruit Salads?

Give me water please.