The newly elected barangay captain of Bajumpandan here in Dumaguete once had a death wish.
After losing both his arms and four toes of his right foot in a construction accident, Crispin Patrimonio, then 26 years of age, asked that he be allowed to die, and that any assistance be given to support his young family.
Crispin had barely finished his BA in Industrial Education, major in Industrial Arts from the Central Visayas Polytechnic College when he married his high school classmate Celestina in 1990. They were both 20 years old.
But instead of pursuing a teaching job, Crispin started to enjoy making money as a casual employee in a softdrink company. Six years later, Crispin left the job to learn welding as an apprentice in his cousin’s shop.
Then the accident happened.
“The steel bar I was holding was sucked by a transmission wire, and I got electrocuted. I was burned all over. When I came to, I realized that the doctors had cut both my arms and four of my toes,” Crispin told the MetroPost in the vernacular.
Luckily for Crispin, his family refused to grant him his death wish. Celestina and their two sons Alvin Chris and Lauren Dale nursed him back to health, and helped him adjust to his new normal. Then their daughter, Natalie, was born a year later.
After six years of joblessness and feeling sorry for himself, Crispin slowly started to recover. “If others are able to accept me for who I am, who am I not to accept my condition?” he asked.
Crispin pursued his dream of getting a house, and applied with the Habitat for Humanity. For his sweat equity, Crispin proved that even without arms, he could shovel sand into a sack and do other manual jobs.
Once he left their Tabuctubig neighborhood to live in their new home at Habitat 3 Village in Bajumpandan, Crispin started selling banana cue around their area. “The banana cue, which my wife would prepare, would be dangling from my right limb, while my earnings would be hanging in a bag on my other limb,” he said, demonstrating how his situation looked.
His perseverance and industry got him noticed in his barangay, to a point that he was invited to run for barangay kagawad to fill the last vacant slot in a slate. He came out No. 2 out of seven kagawads.
From that point on, Crispin felt he was unstoppable, and was in the forefront of every barangay activity.
“Whenever someone from my barangay was hospitalized, I would facilitate the payment of hospital. Whenever someone died, I would help process the death certificate, and make the funeral arrangements. I also involved myself with the youth and other groups.”
With his legislative career at the end of the three-term limit, Crispin then ran, and won as barangay captain of barangay Bajumpandan.
“As a barangay official, you only enjoy the reputation, but not the pay,” he mused.
The honorarium he gets, which started at P5,000 a month until it reached P9,000 a month on his third and last term, is not enough to support a family, and his constituents.
Explaining his charity, Crispin said, “In my mind, I feel good when I help others. It gives me a sense of fulfillment.”
Reflecting on his recent victory as barangay captain, Crispin said he still can not understand how he feels. “I don’t know if I would be happy or sad, because this is a big challenge. I now head the barangay.”
He said he looks forward to everyone’s cooperation as he could not do the job alone. “While others would look at this job as a task, my hope is that I could inspire other PWDs (persons with disability) to persevere so that they will excel in what they do.” (Alex Rey Pal)
