On Oct.15, the writer Ian Rosales Casocot, also MetroPost columnist for at least 20 years, received the news of his career, and he would find it…four days later, on the birthday of my mother, his mother-in-law.
The email had been buried in his inbox, saying his entry, Ceferina in Apartment 2G, had won first prize under the short story category in the 2022 Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Literature.
He had previously submitted it to another literary contest, but it lost, so he applied it for this year’s Palancas. It was his first Palanca in 10 years.
When I asked him about what makes him write, nothing quite gets him to write more than his mother.
“It seems [she] has always been my muse,” he once said to me one afternoon.
It checks out, I thought. She’s been the constant for most of his life. That conversation on that afternoon was a lifetime from where that statement began, when she had him, youngest of the siblings.
His familial wealth had been taken from them by the sugar crisis. His father had disappeared. Home life in Bayawan became school life in Dumaguete, and before the family was able to save enough money to buy a house for themselves–from Ian’s childhood to his college years–they moved nine times.
But Feny remained steadfast on this first move. She had to. She had six boys to feed.
Growing up, Feny learned two things from her family: a penchant for hard work, and a deep Christian faith to propel it. She earned a living by selling peanut butter, and answering hairdressing house calls. She formed her social circle from the connections she made in church. With what she had earned, she was able to send all of her boys to school. She tried to inculcate these gifts to her six sons.
Like her other sons, Feny’s second youngest Rey caught the drive, finished his nursing course. With it, he applied for US citizenship, and migrated abroad. As for the faith, much to her dislike, he lived contrary to it. Being away in the US, Rey could explore a side to him openly…and where else to explore his homosexuality than to find it in sunny Los Angeles?
Despite its comparable weather, Los Angeles was no Dumaguete. Not everyone thought the same.
In 2009, to keep an eye on her, Rey had petitioned for Feny to migrate to the United States. He volunteered his apartment as their domain while she was there. After successfully bringing her abroad, she returned to the Philippines two years after.
Ian never asked her for details of that visit, but he wondered. “What did she do while she was there?”
One afternoon, he plucked that question from his wandering mind and speculated an answer.
He wanted the title of the short story to have his mother’s full first name.
He opened Google Maps and searched for the address of his brother’s apartment: an unassuming beige building surrounded by a grid of streets. In his mind, he placed Feny in Rey’s apartment. He wanted to see how she would spend her day at his brother’s apartment while he was out.
One thing Ian knows is that if Feny doesn’t know what to do…she cleans. With every chore, she discovers the apartment they were living in…and who the man her son grew up to be.
As a conservative parent, she had to confront her son’s artifacts of a gay life. But will she return to what she knows or will she take him as he is?
Feny is still in Dumaguete. She celebrated her 90th birthday this year. She would still go to church every Sunday. We meet each other when she’s out with other family members, trying new cafes or restaurants. She gives me a big hug and she always says God bless you. Much like her son, she knows just what to say.
