Balancing act

I thought I'd put this old photograph here to remind me how woebegone this Wednesday has been. I couldn't dream up a topic I could passably write about.

My inner censor has been working double time, cancelling such subjects as My Mother's Paksiw na Pata, an ode to Mom's meat dish redolent with banana blossoms, laurel leaves and black pepper, with a thick soy-based sauce (censor said it's Holy Week, a time of fasting from red meat, and a rich dish may be offensive to those who are hungry); the unfinished bottle of eau de toilette, lavender scent, from friend Chit Santos (I couldn't possibly dress up, only to realize I have nowhere to go and thus dabbing the behinds of my ears and the base of my neck with lavender was out of the question); mastering the pressing of the snooze button which Bruno Lancelot Lolarga has done by napping in the morning, in the afternoon, then enjoying a full night's sleep, except for peeing time around midnight (see, El President, you are not alone, but Bruno is more handsome than you'll ever aspire to be even if you smoothen the pores on your nose).

Those are the subjects I ticked off mentally as I went about my day. But I did a Bruno--going on snooze mode at 10 a.m., then at 2 p.m. again until a compulsion to record my day impelled me to turn on the computer and attempt something.

I responded to the posts of friends like Pablo Tariman whose short tribute to Kerima Polotan triggered a memory of what might have been an encounter on the phone with the lady. Turns out I was speaking to her secretary, not The Kerima herself. But for many years I deluded myself into imagining it was the legendary writer whose voice I heard on the other end of the phone, inviting me over to pick up my contributor's fees. The fees were my first from a national publication, and I spent all the money on pocketbooks at the old PECO (Philippine Education Company) bookstore in downtown Manila.

If anything, this limbering exercise, a prelude to real writing, is a reminder for me to do more actual physical exercises--the mind loves a walk. Look at Elmer A. Ordoñez, the literary critic, novelist, essayist, who comes back from his evening walks with a Facebook status that reads like a haiku or a tanka. I imagine him with a mandarin painter beside him rendering the images of tagak and frolicking calf into a haiga to deepen the meaning further of the FB status.

My grandchild's pose states, yes, balance there, Booboo (her pet name for me). More walks, more sunshine to get the adrenaline running anew.

Joy T. Dayrit, whole and entire

"Gifted" is an understatement in describing the scope of Joy T. Dayrit's works. She was a writer of short stories and poetry, a painter, a children's art teacher and friend to many writers and artists. She was an admirable woman for whom a disability was no cause for diminishing her zest for life.

The Ateneo Library of Women's Writings (ALIWW) and the Ateneo de Manila University Press launched Light, her selected stories, in a slim, elegantly designed book in a color brighter than celadon green. 

Portrait of Joy Dayrit by Elaine Nuvas

 Edna Zapanta Manlapaz, book editor and ALIWW founder, remembered Josephine Teodoro Dayrit, who used the professional name "Joy T. Dayrit," as a meticulous writer who would submit to the latter's class several drafts of the same work in graduate school. Manlapaz would be stumped to look for what was outstandingly new about it. She'd read the latest draft line by line until she discovered that an adjective was deleted, and that discovery would make Dayrit smile.

The writer-painter's chair and cane served as subject for a series of paintings.

This meticulousness informed even her art. A fine example is the series "My Chair/30 Times" wherein she painted 30 versions of her chair and cane as subject. Somehow, it reminded one of Wallace Stevens's famous poem "Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird."

 As Manlapaz said, it was quintessentially Dayrit to do repetitions with variations (the hallmark of a distinct style), perhaps with an eye to perfection. It also proves that anything can feed the imagination of a disciplined writer and painter which Dayrit was.

Quite telling in her story "A Quiet Infidelity" is how a persevering priest and a successful accountant, once childhood sweethearts, tame their ardor with just a chaste kiss exchanged between them.

In "Roda," the title character chides friend Greg for working hard to make a name for himself in a business office, for always being hurried and not setting aside time to relax and to enjoy his friends' company. This story serves as postlude to an earlier one where Roda's life is cut short by a sudden illness and Greg appears as one of the mourners.

There are no highly dramatic, emotionally draining and tear-jerking scenes. Dayrit's prose is clean and spare that one is almost tempted to call it "Hemingwayesque". But that would make her turn in her grave for in one of her journals, she bristled at a comment made by National Artist Nick Joaquin who during a meeting with women writers, said aloud how they could write if they were pregnant or busy raising small children.

This is where ALIWW's mission comes in: restoring Dayrit to her place in the literary canon. After all, she won literary prizes from the Palanca Memorial Awards and Focus Philippines literary content apart from her stories passing the astute editorial eye of Joaquin himself and getting published in the pre-martial law Philippines Free Press.

Her reflection on a new typewriter ribbon

At the ALIWW exhibit that pays tribute to the writer-painter, the space is made out like Dayrit's private office and library. On the walls are paintings large and small, especially selected by her dear friend Roberto Chabet, the esteemed father of Philippine contemporary art. The look of her desk is recreated with a word bank (a wooden box) near her electric typewriter which, one assumes, she utilized to get what's known as "writing prompts" to get her started.

Good friends: Roberto Chabet clowns around while Dayrit smiles, unaware.

 Her eyeglasses are there, as though she had just taken them off to stand up, stretch, step out to take a snack or go to the toilet, leaving a sheet of newsprint paper fed in the typewriter with a playful reflection on what it's like to have a dual-colored typewriter ribbon. It reads: "My new typewriter ribbon is black and red. I had wanted only black, but that was out of stock. So black and red it is. If you go with the flow, it could be fun."

Mobiles for children's enjoyment

 This fun-loving side of her is reflected in the colorful mobiles hanging from the inside of an open antique closet. These heart-shaped mobiles painted back to back were meant for her grand-nephews and grand-nieces to play with.

Underneath the glass-topped tables are photos of Dayrit from childhood to adulthood. In almost all of them is her bright, brave smile, even as she was being fitted with leg braces. Manlapaz quoted the late Kerima Polotan who once told sculptor Julie Lluch, "When Joy enters a room, she lights it up."

Some of her box paintings and her favorite books, including The Little Prince

 In her journals, Dayrit wondered what her true calling was: writer or painter? One day, she quit agonizing when she realized that she was happy being both, that she did not need to fragment herself, that words and images were what defined her.

The ALIWW exhibit, which runs till Aug. 31, has been visited by droves of freshmen since the schoolyear started. It bodes well. Dayrit's writings and art are alive.--Text and photos by Elizabeth Lolarga

First published by Vera Files/Yahoo Philippines, July 13, 2012