I was picking up some last minute things for my friend's wedding tomorrow when I was asked to drop by the grocery store to pick up a dozen eggs. The lines in the check-out counter were kilometric and even if there were hearts dangling all over the place, I could say "all the loving'" was the the last thing everybody was feeling.
I lined up at the express counter which allows payment for baskets or carts carrying 15 items only. It was exactly like the rest of the supermarket - bursting with people jostling for space, toddlers crying and kids going through the gondolas near the counter, asking mama to buy a stick of gum or a bag of candy. A guy and his best friend were ahead of me, carrying a basket of chips and some prune juice (or so I think it was prune juice). I cradled the eggs on one hand while I started texting with the other. I was dead-tired since school had started early in the morning and all I wanted to go home, have dinner and then walk the dog before going to sleep. I was suspiciously eyeing a cart half-full with groceries which was parked right beside the express check-out counter, wondering what in the world it was doing there.
The next thing I know, this lady of about 40 elbows her way past us and starts pushing the cart in between the two guys ahead of me and the girl standing in front of them. "Excuse me," she said. "That's my spot," she indicated, pointing at the microscopic space between the girl and the two guys ahead of me.
Bewildered, I glanced at the sign in the counter to check if I was indeed in the right queue. The sign remained the same, still screaming "Express Counter, 15 items or less." My eyes ricocheted to the lady's half-full cart. I am no mathematician but there was no way either beyond or below the stratosphere that the items inside the cart would amount to 15. It was more like 15 sets of 15.
She kept on jabbing her cart at the eensie-weensie space in front of the two guys. One of them, a guy in a brown shirt with closely cropped hair let out a very polite protest. "Ma'am," he began to say, "this is an express lane. Only fifteen items are allowed per transaction."
I eyed the lady who was now teetering close to an uproar. Her eyes bulged as she started pulling items out of her cart. "I know," she said curtly. "That's why I'm transferring my items to a basket," she declared.
She should not have said basket. She should have said basketS. Yes, that's with an "S" as huge as the Rio Grande.
She and her husband started pulling out one basket after another, filling each basket with, you guessed it, fifteen items and then lining them up in the express counter. The two guys and I watched with eyes aghast as she did this rather mechanically, dropping one item after another into one basket, two baskets, three baskets…four…
I had never been so flabbergasted in my entire life. Well, no, maybe I have been before but what I meant was, I had never been this stumped in the longest time. We all know very well what the point of having an express counter is. The name precisely implies its purpose. But this lady was being smart about the entire set-up and was working around a prohibition, much like a lot of people in this country. In fact, much like a lot of lawyers in this country. Haha. Anyway, if she was tired, so were we. If she hated long lines, so did we. If she wanted to go home, so did we. If she had a long day, she could take a look at mine and realize it was equally as intense. We were in the same boat, pari passu as my Banking teacher would say. It just so happened that the sign technically allowed us to fall in line right there but the same could not be said for her. But, no! She was going to have her way and we either had to take it, leave it or face up to her. And man, did I want to stand up to her, to tell her she can't just push us around like that, not when the sign has clearly chosen our side, no matter which court in the land takes jurisdiction of our potential dispute.
I wound my fingers around the egg crate and did a mental countdown that my mom told me to do whenever I felt my internal fuse box starts to spew fumes of some sort. "Patience," I told myself. When part of the plastic crate went "creak," I stopped with the squeezing lest I crack one of the eggs. I bit my lip so as to diffuse the anger that was now welling up within me.
"1…2…3…" I began to count when all of a sudden, out of nowhere, I just burst like a bubble - and started snickering. It wasn't a sarcastic, sinister kind of laugh. It was laugh that was initially born out of audacity and was now nurtured by nothing but sheer amusement. I stifled my gurgles with my handkerchief and turned away from the sight of the lady and the two men before me. True, this lady was mean and unfair but, in a way, she was also outrageously, creatively funny. And besides, it was Valentine's Day and the world needs some love going around.
The two men ahead of me were fuming mad and moved to the express counter beside us which had an even longer queue. I followed suit, still with my handkerchief practically glued to my mouth, still fending off sporadic snickers. The line moved slowly until I finally got to the cashier and paid for my plastic crate of eggs. As the bagger handed me the plastic bag with my purchase, I eyed the the counter where I had originally stood earlier.
The lady still stood there, two people away from the counter, her baskets clumped around her like eggs arranged in a mother bird's nest.
Since tomorrow is Valentine's Day, I figured I could at least ride along with the lovey-dovey feel and the deluge of pink and red. Back in college, my friends and I used to have a movie marathon come February 14 (of the weekend closest to that day). We'd rent the sappiest, cheesiest romantic movies, pile up on the chips and chocolate and lug around huge bottles of soda then soak ourselves in a jacuzzi of all the schmaltz possible, non-stop from morning till…er…early the next morning.
Now since I am practically drowning in all the saccharine possible, I'll just pour on more sugar and get as mawkish as possible as I go through my list of favorite romantic books and movies and, of course, sappy love songs.
Though I've never been a huge fan of the romantic genre when it comes to my books, there have been a number of standouts in my bookshelf - and nothing beats the classics. Wuthering Heights is as sweeping as the lush moors which bear witness to Catherine and Heathcliff's turbulent love for each other. Pride and Prejudice is quirky and entertaining in its own right - no matter how quaint it may seem at every page - and I indeed have lost count of the number of times I asked myself, "Will Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy end up with each other?" Nicholas Sparks churns out one charming story after another but my favorites have to be the book-turned-movie A Walk to Remember and The Rescue, a poignant story about a troubled fireman, a single mother and her autistic son. An interesting pick is Train Man, a Japanese novel of sorts which actually looks like an Internet forum, complete with posts from fictional netheads and even graphics. It follows the travails of a quiet, nerdy guy who falls for a girl he meets on a train in Tokyo. Not knowing how to ask her out, he asks for help from an Internet forum where anonymous people all help in, pitching in advice bits here and dating tips there.
In terms of movies, rom-coms are among my favorites but I also like the serious ones. One of my ultimate favorites is the monochromatic classic Casablanca. I love the contrast between the sardonic yet sentimental Rick (Humphrey Bogart) and the sweet but tortured Ilsa (Ingrid Bergman). The movie's dark conclusion on the airport runway, along with Rick's trademark swipe at Ilsa ("Here's looking at you, kid."), will always make this movie memorable. Roman Holiday is generally light, fun, predictable and made me pine for my own Vespa. However what makes it a choice pick is the movie's final scene, after Princess Ann (Audrey Hepburn) ends her press conference and walks out, leaving newsman Joe (Gregory Peck) all alone to traverse an empty hallway. The miniseries version of Pride and Prejudice did not disappoint. Neither did Colin Firth and Jennifer Ehle who were both born to play Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth Bennett, respectively.
To complete the schmaltz attack and the Valentine fever, music has to enter the picture. Apo Hiking Society's Panalangin is easy on the ears yet bursting with optimism, especially in the new version of the song courtesy of Moonstar88. One of my favorites, Take That's Back for Good, has poetic prose for lyrics while Jon McLaughlin's So Close is, well, enchanting. Side A's Forevermore is one of my ultimate favorite love songs as it is brimming with hope and promise. I keep my fingers crossed that someday, I'd get the chance to sing it for one or two of my best friends on their respective (future) altar dates. That and, maybe, Endless Love (we could borrow Mr. Schuster for a while).
Love songs though do not always have to be sweet and sappy. I also like stirring, emotive songs sung by hauntingly beautiful voices such as You're Still You by Josh Groban, Every Little Thing by Dishwalla and Yuki no Hana (Snowflower) by Japanese singer Mika Nakashima. But in terms of a song being both "haunting" and "beautiful," no other song fits the description to a perfect G-clef other than You by The Carpenters. There is nothing grand about the music or the lyrics. As a matter of fact, it is the song's innate simplicity that makes it absolutely perfect in my scale (pun absolutely intended). After all, lines like "You are one who makes me happy" and "You are one of the few things worth remembering" are certainly quite tough to beat as they are rather plain to see but beautiful when heard.
Fine.
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