Fear, peace in prayer, covered smiles

Dear COVID-19,

I wasn’t born paranoid. I had ways of dealing with uncertainty in my youth, but worry and fear were not for me.

But this wave of paranoia you induced leaves me floundering. People I know getting infected, ICU-ed, dying even. It feels like you put me on a boat without a paddle. Fear, anxiety, sadness all rolled into one ball of helplessness.

Of course, you cannot be accused of racial discrimination. You are color-blind. Everyone is a target: black, brown, white, yellow. Neither can you be accused of social distinction. You destroy all: the poor and the wealthy, the gendered and the genderless, young and old alike. Nor can you be accused of political philandering. You infect the right, the left, and the in-between.

What can I do? Aside from protecting myself from you while waiting for a vaccine to be developed, what can I do? There are no rules, no precedence. The news I get feeds my paranoia. The silence of quarantine dampens my spirit. I get restless.

What’s there to do for a girl now opening her Mom’s “aparador” searching for anything her Mom might have wanted to tell her? She finds none. Neither is there anything from her Dad who followed her Mom just a week after you infected her. No trace of them preparing for their end. They just died, were hastily bundled up, and cremated without their child seeing them go. There were no goodbyes. How could you be so cruel?

Yet, you cannot destroy us. We may be wearing the look of devastation on our faces, but thank God the morning sun still shines. There’s peace as we wrap our fingers in prayer. There’s joy in the zoomed togetherness of family. These blessings, they must water our souls.

Sincerely,

Lady of Situation 1

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Dear COVID-19,

Do you know that in a March 2020 survey of the world’s happiest people, we ranked third among the countries in Southeast Asia and 69th in the world? We have earned a national nickname: the smilingest. We smile for nearly every reason, even for no special reason at all. Our smile is seemingly our national badge.

The neighborhood of a Pinoy smile covers quite an area — from just off the border of a pout (“simangot”) to before it breaks the sound barrier of a chuckle (“hagikgik”). In between should be “ngusngus,” “ngisngis,” “ngibi,” “ngibik,” “ngiwi,” “ngisi,” and “ngiti.” Any perceptible stretching or pursing of the lips has a meaning. And this meaning multiplies in ambiguous ways, reflecting our affiliations, biases, emotions, social class, motives.

Pinoys smile, be it for pleasure or guilt, for joy or shame, for fun or dismay, for cheer or fear. It can be alluring, like the smile of a losing candidate caught frozen on a tarpaulin facing my kitchen window. It can be heartbreaking, like the smile of a disconsolate widow. It can be deceiving, hurting, insulting, intriguing. It can be tentative and configured, depending on the situation. Somewhere in the neighborhood of a Pinoy smile, one can find, if he’s searching, a shimmering pond that mirrors the soul.

But what have you done? You’ve caused us to hide our smiles underneath masks and shields. How now will we find the badge of a happy people?

Sincerely,

Lady of Situation 2

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Bibbet Palo, 75, is a retired teacher.