Attack of the fiesta pox

On the day I was supposed to graduate, chicken pox kept me in bed. But that didn’t stop my family from throwing a party.

Father flew back from Saudi. Carpenters came for house repairs. Three cooks were hired and a grand feast was designed.

“Can’t we just postpone it for when I’m feeling better?” I asked my parents.

“We suffered to get you educated,” my mother said. “Now we celebrate. Get back to bed,” she added and went back to listing the dishes they wanted to cook.

Undaunted, I dragged myself to my father. “I wonder how much we will spend?” I told him. I had been hoping they’d give me a computer for a graduation gift, but I was too shy to make the request.

“Don’t think about it,” said my father.

D-day approached, plans grew on plans, and the pox proceeded to thrash my body like a crowd rushing out of a mall on closing time. “We’re inviting the Kapitan and his wife, of course,” I heard my mother say as she drew up the guest list which had grown to include half the barrio.

They kept reminding me that I was the youngest and only son- as if I could forget that- and my graduation was reason enough to slay the fattened cow. Never mind if the house would have to be mortgaged to pay for the cow.

It began to dawn on me that I was not the celebrator-my parents were. Though they took the initiative to invite my former high school classmates and friends, the party was really their plan, their gimmick, their chance to gloat as their friends came to congratulate them for their success.

“We’re going to have it (the party) videoed,” my parents told me.

“No way,” I told them. No way my pustular face would end up on video. I hated pictures; more so videos. “Don’t worry,” my mother assured me, “you won’t be videotaped.”

But of course the video was not for me. It was for their future viewing pleasure.

The event started promptly at 11:00am. I was kept in my room upstairs, served a feast my pox-numbed taste buds couldn’t enjoy. By 11:30, someone was using the karaoke imitating Humperdinck, laughter burst here and there, and, by the ruckus that sounded like a gaggle of geese, I imagined the party was in full swing.

At lunchtime, I took a peek downstairs and all I saw was a flowing mat of heads. The house was packed. I feared the walls would burst from overcrowding. I wanted to go down- the Masque of Spotted Death- to spoil the fun. But peeking made me tipsy and my knees had become too weak.

Then my high school classmates came up to my room and, standing behind my bed, they cracked jokes, while I was lying down feeling dizzy. So this is how a corpse in the dissecting table of med school feels, I told myself.

All through the turmoil, I consoled myself with one thought: revenge. Vengeance would be my absence in the videotape. It’s your party, I thought, and I’ll vanish if I want to-hah!

The day after the party, my parents came up to me. “As soon as you’re better and your pockmarks disappear,” my father told me, “we’ll complete the video.” Complete the-?!

Days later, in an itchy toga, pockmarks masked by a touch of powder, I alighted from a car which never left our house that day, was welcomed by relatives who wore the same clothes as they had during the party, and entered our house like I had just come from my graduation. All choreographed for the camera.

The man taking the video, a sly one if I had seen one, told my parents he could splice things together to make it look like I had really made it to the rites and the party. “Okay,” he told me as he kept the camera focused on me. “Smile now. Someone’s shaking your hands now, congratulating you onstage. Now you see your friends on your right. Smile to them…etc.” and all that fuss.

Talk about irony. I was graduating in broadcast journalism, with a solemn vow not to abuse this power to “edit” reality. And there I was, an accessory to a video hoax.

A week later, my parents were brandishing the black, offending videotape. “Let’s watch it,” they told me and revved up the video deck. “ I think I’m getting a pox relapse,” I said and went upstairs.

Now, my family is always ready to show the videotape to anyone. And if you happen to drop by our house and forced to watch the tape, look closely. You’ll notice that I only appear in tight shots and close-ups, and all shots of the graduation ceremonies are taken from a distance. And if you’re from my batch, you’ll probably worry why you have a different memory of the graduation march.

I have, of course, gotten over most of the angst I suffered in my virtual graduation. I can now smile when I recall the event. After all, it’s all recorded on a betamax tape, and manufacturers have stopped making betamax machines.

(With thanks to Monique Tolentino)

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Published 17 March 1996, Manila Times