Can't take the house out of the man

OFTEN I have dreams happening inside the houses I've lived in while growing up.

It's been 10 years since I left the neighborhood and built a home of my own with my family some 60 kilometers away, but when I dream of something taking place in a house, it's always the houses I've known when I was a kid.

Rarely was my dreams set in our present home in Bulacan. But I reckon our house right now would be the default setting of Mavi and Maxi's dreams even in their adult years.

I came to think about it because a few weeks back I bought something from Mercury Drug in the corner of Luis Shianghio St. and Kamuning Road. It was the exact same spot where my parents used to have a sari-sari store in my pre-teens. In front we sold softdrinks, cigarettes, LPG, candies, and behind it served as our living quarters.

The counter where the pharmacist took my orders used to be the spot where we placed a table so people in the summer can have halo-halo sitting down. Its parking space used to be a small plot where my brother Jonjon burned his eyebrows lighting a mound of gunpowder from the previous night's New Year's Eve celebration.

Just a block away stood an apartment building which served as our first house. Several years back, when I already had a job but was living in another house nearby, the place was converted into a multi-level beer joint. One evening after work I tried to visit the place and have few bottles there.

In short I had that Jack Nicholson moment in About Schmidt where he journeyed back to his old house only to find a tire store built on its place. Dennis Lambert also touched on it in a heartfelt song that began with these lines: ``They're tearing down the streets where I grew up, like pouring brandy in my dixie cup...they're pouring concrete on a part of me, no trials for killing off a memory...''

We hit four of six winning numbers

SOME years back I had the chance to become one of the lotto draw observers. There were six of us in a panel and I represented the media sector. The draw was then being held at the government-owned station, NBN-4 in Visayas Ave., in Quezon City.

I arrived there an hour before the 9 p.m. draw. Early enough to catch the then host Tina Revilla rehearsing her opening spiel and marvel at how well the lady carries herself even when cramming for her lines. She was wearing thick foundation, bright red lipstick and big, brown and bouncy hairdo.

I didn't see any reason to doubt the draw. There was nothing underneath the table from which the tambiolo is placed. And we got to touch at random the numbered balls that was to be sucked up by the drawing machine.

The gig, much-anticipated by my family and neighbors back in Kamuning, earned me P1,600 as honorarium. That for just staying put for about two hours and watching the whole proceedings happen on live nationwide television.

A few weeks later, I was watching the draw on the office TV sets. I was clutching my ticket which bore my favorite numbers – 9, 21, 42, 11, 2, 32. Revilla started to call out the winning numbers, one by one, in the order that I would never forget:

``9, 12, 42, 11....''

By that time I was already hysterical, unmindful of my officemates who by then already realized that I was headed for richness and fame.

``1, and 34..congratulations to the winning combination ticket holder of 9, 21, 42, 11, 1, 34.''

In a matter of seconds I came crashing back to reality. I got the first four numbers correct only to miss the last two in the narrowest margin possible. Just like that, I missed the P9 million jackpot.

It came to me again because this afternoon we found out that the combination Mavi chose for my father-in-law to bet on got four of six winning numbers. It won us P1,000. Back then the consolation for four correct number was only P500.