Right at the moment of old-school writing (viz, with paper and pen), a storm rages with intermittent strength. As the windows and doors rattled in the menacing wind, my fidgety mind streams vision of unhinged doors and windows whooshing around the village. Buntings of last month's fiesta now lies cluttered on the streets while the howling wind sings a doleful duet with my door chimes.
The usually noisy village is not unlike a forgotten graveyard for now. And, for me, it is bliss. It is bliss not hearing a local radio host's gruff rantings from the neighbor's presumably ancient transistor radio. It is bliss not hearing someone belting out the latest ear-flinching pop song. It is bliss to merely hear the sweet scratching of my pen on paper which gives me a silencegasm.
Silence is bliss.
I can hear every whirring of machines in the house not excluding my addled brain. Silence sent a cerebral jolt compelling me to remember the existence of QuaintQuill.
Indeed, silence is bliss. And I have Storm Fengshen to thank for that. (Although, I am immensely sorry for the lives that were lost and claimed by storm Fengshen.)
Just as the moon is the pale tenant of the sun to Jeanette Winterson in Lighthousekeeping, the storm is the contraption that brings me back in time ------- to the undemanding and uncomplicated time of my childhood. Sadly, as I'm about to recount the wonderful bits of my younger days, the storm is slowly ebbing away. Inevitably, its gradual demise revives the galling racket. And, as the noise gains momentum, my mind's grasp of memories loosens.
The last strains of my bliss vanishes until all I hear is the peddler's shouts of "Budbud, budbud mo diha..!" (Budbud in Cebuano and Suman in Tagalog is a Philippine delicacy.)
written as of 06/21/2008 at 06:44 AM
