Losing folks and friends

LETTERS FROM THE AGNO

March Fianza

     

Once in a blue moon, we cross that moment when life seems empty, or something is missing but we do not know what that is. Bothered and worried, we examine situations and think until we recognize that such a feeling is part of the old life that one has gone through. That includes meeting familiar faces and passing by places that remind us of people and friends who used to be around us but were gone recently.

With no word of farewell to family, relatives, Domci and friends; newsperson and colleague BabooMondonedo travelled on the last Thursday of last month to an editorial room that knows no mistakes. Certainly, she worries no more for she is welcomed by news colleagues who left ahead of her.  

For us who have to move on as we still have pleasant sufferings to do; I remember Loo, Buguias where the mix Kankanaey-Kalanguya community embraced Baboo as one of their own during that colorful First Kalanguya Congress in 1994. Loo community elders christened her “Avucay”.

Perhaps, that display of Igorot hospitality in Loo sparked a change in her life – loving and living closer to the Cordillera crags than the air-conditioned rooms in Metro Manila. Later on, she became the real forest dweller she wanted to be by building a practical house surrounded by Chinese Bamboos under the Pine Trees at Tam-awan, Pinsao.

Once in a while, close friends and colleagues come to disagreements. And so there were times in the middle of Session Road when the late Peppot the Great and Domci and Baboo would argue on things they suddenly forget when they sober up in the morning.

I also had differences with them about editorial pieces that I did not want published as these could twist the paper’s consistent stand on an issue. But I dumped those arguments right away in the waste basket as advised by Aunt Cecil. Months later, Baboo apologized for those pointless arguments. Many miss her now.

********

            Weeks earlier, my cousin Richard (Bootsie) LamsisTotanes jumped on his steed and raced towards Mount Pulag, leaving behind Manang Juanita, the love of his life; and kids Geraldine, Vivian and Eric.

            ManongBootsie related to me stories of his younger days spent with his barkada at Lapu-lapu and Lakandula areas. I imagine, that was the time when it was harder to survive in those parts of Baguio than in the Wild West or at the OK Corral in Tombstone, Arizona.

            Lately, I learned from his old acquaintances that they had their better days as “cowboys” at the Pacdal Bridle Path with Nelson and Johnson Oyas, his neighbors at “Tres” and Parapad, La Trinidad; Togan of Brookside, PiloCarantes of New Lucban and TaimongMolintas of Gibraltar.

            The mountains around Baguio and Trinidad had slowly shifted color from green and yellow sunflowers to G.I. sheets by the time I was old enough to shoot bottles with them. Although on different occasions, I heard their stories of how they burned up their days at Baguio City High.

They were never the cowboys we saw on silver screens but they loved country songs and lived life as real cowboys – learning unwritten rules of the streets until they separated ways while their best days were nearing their sunsets. ManongBootsie wore an infectious that I miss. He had an occasional temper. I will miss that, too.

********

Last week, I received a text message about the untimely departure of Judge Pete K. Laoagan, Jr. He was 62. I met Manong Pete with lawyers BubutOlarte and William Bacoling when they were still law students at BCF in the late 70s. It is a small world indeed as I did not know that the guy they were teasing to be topnotcher in the bar would later become a cousin-in-law.

Manong Pete was a story-teller, a historian and an anthropologist in his own right. With no “kodigo”, he can relate family relations and family trees of Ibaloy clans in Bokod, Kabayan and Itogon. Listening to him on several occasions, his research on family trees were more factual than the researches done by some that I know.

Out of court, the jolly Judge Laoagan would take time to attend wakes, attend Ibaloy gatherings and on unguarded moments, I would catch him swinging glasses with the cooks and partidors around a silyasi.

He served in several courts until his untimely demise on December 01, 2015. He left behind his loving wife, Leticia DipasLaoagan; and kids Joyce, Lester, Clarence, Rajiv and Jeffrey. He will be interred at a family lot along Ambuclao Road at Apalan, Itogon, Benguet. Many will surely miss his jokes and stories.

********

            My mother Prospera through this space wishes to extend her sympathies to the family of the late Mrs. Juanita Tumpap Bay-an ofAbatan, Buguias, a distant relative and family friend, and the mother-in-law of cousin Tomas BamboyTotanes. Her remains now lie in state at their family residence in Abatan where she will be interred on a date to be announced soon. She is a respected and well-loved elder in the North of Benguet. She was 92.