Dogbert’s Whip

“The trouble with salted fish is water retention,” I heard the pompous lady tell her friend over breakfast. It’s so unlike me to eavesdrop on other people’s meal conversations. But this morning, since I ate alone, I was rather observant with the most trivial of human activity. I noticed, for example, that the Indian-looking man who also and often ate alone was having his usual breakfast – a single fried egg and two slices of white bread. How would he ever survive before lunch time?

Like most mornings nowadays, I find myself just staring at thin air. As if in a trance, the PC right before me transforms to a swivel of acrylic paint, clumsily slopped on canvas by a mediocre Fine Arts major. “No one ever notices what I do anyway; so why bother?” I’ve never been this lazy in my entire life. I’m in desperate need of a breather. Sugar Hiccup’s “Womb” is playing in the background and I feel strangely gratified. I’m slowly losing my sense of will to do anything productive. I’m sorely exhausted, and I can’t do anything about it.

A map of southwest Luzon was given to me by my boss, and had asked me to analyze it. Months have passed and I’m still staring at the map rather absentmindedly. I should’ve submitted a report a zillion years ago and yet, all I could ever think of are memories from yore. “There are three Quaternary stratovolcanoes directly south of Laguna de Bay,” my volcanology professor once told me. “I know,” I said rather cockily back then. “Mt. Makiling, Mt. Malepunyo, and Mt. Banahaw – all are mainly andesitic, by the way.” I squint my eyes to pinpoint the location of these ash-and-earth emitters. When I finally found them – etched pink ellipses on the landscape – I wondered why the person who made the map had not opted for gray instead.

My office pet, a carved wooden carabao I call Guyito, stands proudly on top of my monitor. “How are you feeling today,” he asks with his pointy horns raised. “And why the heck did you name me after that caricature from the Philippine Daily Inquirer?” I wanted to tell Guyito how sorry I am for being less than creative with his borrowed name. I also wanted to tell him how miserable I was, how it felt to have only loved once, and that now, I’m in shambles. I wanted to tell him that sadness, although not readily detected at times, is a thick hypodermic needle that zaps the soul out of us. Most of all, I wanted to tell him how badly I wanted to get my love back, and how dejected I am since I’m pretty sure it’ll never happen anymore. Never…

I wanted to say all that but I didn’t since he’s not likely to understand. And most of all, he will never answer back.

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