Joy
Words escaped me one early morning when I stopped from brisk-walking on the NIA Road in Gulod and looked at the horizon beaming with sunshine.
I tried to describe to myself in one word what I beheld: a solitary tree with leafless branches reaching out to the sky. The rays of the morning sun seeped through the cumulus clouds, as if an apparition was about to arrive. A couple of white birds darted here and there, aimless in their flight. The scent of the field heavy with morning dew was mesmerizing. My heart started to relax; the panting, caused by about an hour of roaming around the area, began to subside. As I adjusted my face mask, I looked for the perfect word to describe the moment. I found it.
Joy.
It was pure joy that enveloped me in that moment. Amid the fear caused by the health pandemic, I found joy in the scenery. To be joyful is to have faith. To be joyful is to choose faith over fear. In Gulod, like in any other place in the time of coronavirus, faith and fear are conjoined twins — breathing the same air, residing in one body, beating in one heart. But always, always, faith is the better ruler in a plain of uncertainty. And faith is the vaccine of the fearful soul.
I continued in my brisk walk. At every turn, I found both serenity and confusion in people doing their morning routines. The ones wearing face masks and face shields stayed away from the ones who were nonchalant about the virus. There was growth and decay as a new subdivision was being constructed, obstructing the serene view of Mt. Makiling. There was tenacity and reservation in the eyes of the barangay brigade who tried to impose rules of social distancing and health protocols. Amid the unseen enemy, the human spirit is its own armor.
Amid the fear caused by the health pandemic, I found joy in the scenery. To be joyful is to have faith. To be joyful is to choose faith over fear.
Joy is a good armor. My dearest friend Rachy Cuna told me it’s always good to be afraid if it means being vigilant about the virus. But in the same breath, he also said that one can’t be afraid all the time. To rob oneself of the opportunity to be happy despite the pandemic is to invite other diseases. Caution is needed, though, to exercise joy, he added. “Joy is good for the heart. It boosts the immune system. It cures pain. Joy makes you productive whether or not you work from home,” Rachy said. And science proves his claims.
“We should pursue joy the way we pursue love,” philosophized PJ Morante, my student in my Sunday writing class, when I recounted to him the bliss I felt that day. Through time, PJ has become my dependable ally and close friend. “What will be left of us if we are constantly reminded of fear during this time? It’s good to be afraid (of the virus) but it’s bad that we lose our joy because of our fear. So, we practice caution. And even so, we try to be joyful under the circumstances. We should always find our source of joy,” he added.
Gulod, a small barangay that is home to 16,473 residents (with about 60 infected with the virus), is a source of joy for me. Many times, the barrio where I was born and raised also serves as the muse in my writing. To the east is the Bundok ng Susong Dalaga. To the west can be seen the ridge of Tagaytay on a clear, clear day. To the south is the view of the mysterious Mt. Makiling. To the north, on a starless night, is a horizon that twinkles with the lights of Metro Manila.
I wish I could say Gulod is completely flawless, but it is not. It broke my heart a couple of times but it also helped me heal. It is a place where people can just drop by your house and engage you in small talk — yes, even during the pandemic. Even if emblazoned in your gate is a hugecardboard that says: “Bawal pumasok ang mga hindi taga dito.” I scratch my head every time someone we know from the neighborhood tries to unlatch the gate to our home. But we would rather err on the side of being unaccommodating rather than be exposed to someone who would like to enter the compound without a face mask. (My mother, a social animal, misses the outside world. But she also knows she is immunocompromised so she contents herself by communicating with her siblings and friends via videocalls. Many times they talk about the past, which means their beautiful memories before COVID-19.)
Gulod, for me, is a playground of childhood memories. The NIA Road may be lined with bright and bursting Bandera Espanolanow but when I was kid it was a dirt road traversed by farmers who took care of the irrigation of their respective farms. It was a place where the dapog (seedbeds) of some farmers could be found.
But now, the NIA Road teems with life. Ambulant vendors display their produce during the weekend. The freshest vegetables are spread on improvised tables as people flock to buy them. Snacks are served in makeshift stalls. The choice is yours: pancit guisado, arroz caldo, tapsilog, buco juice, suman, puto.
People roam around the area. The teenagers discover young love, sweet love as they promenade. The bikers come for their early morning or late afternoon ride. The dreamers sit on concrete benches by the roadside, inhaling the fresh breeze, writing poems, watching the day go by.
As for me, I court joy there as I do my daily brisk walking exercise. I see joy in the happy faces of people — even if most of their faces are covered by masks. I see it in flocks of birds, some migratory, that build nests in the middle of the rice field. I feel it in the soft and tender rays of the morning sun. I bask in it as I enjoy the kaleidoscopic portrait that the sunset paints on the sky.
The promdi in me is completely in love with Gulod. It gives me great joy to live in this place.