BENCHWARMER

Six dream Ferraris on the wall
RAMON DACAWI

BAGUIO CITY -- If you use a car that runs on premium gas, I need your support. It’s Christmas and time doesn’t give me a choice but to go personal, now that the season of sharing begins to thaw hearts. It is with urgency that I make this pitch, as the opportunity offered would be over three weeks from today. By then, even my prospective Samaritans won’t be able to do anything to help fulfill my now deep-seated wish for this yuletide.

It’s an obsession that suddenly took form before dawn three Sundays ago. We were then gassing up the office Tamaraw FX cramped with Baguio’s football players at the Shell station near Alabang where those posh housing subdivisions are. A promotional sign caught my eye and got me hooked the moment I understood what it was all about. .

By sunrise, the feeling was all-consuming, like wild fire It developed so fast, like a revved up red Ferrari that had just been flagged off. By the time the Baguio Cinderellas - a ragtag squad that dominated national women’s football for over 15 year –were playing, my dream of a dream car was zooming through the enclave of the rich.

Mind you, I was so possessed by the wish that I was unmindful how the girls were scoring or that their uniforms had seen better days. That's why I need your fueling station receipts. Not just any receipt, but the one issued if you normally gas up premium at Shell. This sounds like unpaid advertising and I apologize. (Mea culpa, dear friend and sister Marian Catedral and the rest of my buddies from Caltex.)

Once I get to collect your premium gas receipts reflecting a total sale of P3,000, I’ll get to buy six Ferrari car models at P49 a piece. Not just any car but those matchbox models of red Ferrari, that prestigious, expensive status symbol and king of the race tracks – and of the road – that Shell is offering at promotional prizes.

Don’t get me wrong. I hardly had any matchbox model toy in my childhood. In my over 50 years of walking and riding jeeps or even taxis, I never dreamt of having a vehicle. It’s hazardous to my wallet – the purchase, the fuel,, the maintenance, the insurance, the violation tickets.

Like my son Boogie, I never had a car and I can’t drive. At times, I get to ride a car, courtesy of friends. As Manong Swanny Dicang observes, it’s cheaper to have friends with cars than to buy one. (Or to have a mother-in-law than to rent an apartment.)

The six red Ferraris will be for two kids -Lukie, 6, and Dylan, who just turned one.They are the sons of Boogie and his wife Lovelyn. They were born where they make those real Ferraris, where their parents have to be so they can raise a family. I have met Lukie three times and ache to shake Dylan’s hand.

When Lukie was three- before he learned to ride the bus - he had the distinction of being the only kid to go to pre-kinder on a kiddie chair mounted on his dad’s bicycle. All his classmates were car-driven. Yet in our dream walks together when he was here for a while, Lukie would rattle off the brands of all car models parked and passing us by.

With your help, I can get to hang those six Ferrari models on my wall, below my own son’s “Our Formula for a Perfect Sunday”, an article he wrote about a week-end at home with his car-less family watching those Ferrari cars race on TV.

Lukie and Dylan will have the cars when they come home and later get to read what their dad wrote about family. The more receipts you give, the more cars I can buy –for other kids out there. Before Shell runs out of stock and the promo – and Christmas – is over.(e-mail: rdacawi@yahoo.com for comments – and about your premium gas receipts).