sitting amuck

Do you know that I was supposed to be born during the yuletide season of 1979? But it wasn’t until two weeks into the then new year when I finally came out.

My mom would explain that she had the most difficult time giving birth to me because aside from being too big, as in 8.5 pounds big, I got into some cord coil. You see, even at zero age, I was already getting caught in some tangle. Of course such situation is not entirely of my doing. My mom confessed to consuming unbelievable amounts of sugar and caffeine (courtesy of the then newly opened donut king), which what probably got me spinning around inside her tummy (thus the cord coil) and got me tipping the scales.

Now that I’m caught in yet another tangle, I assume that aside from the delivery room drama, which set off all the panic alarms on earth and had the angels in heaven shouting: “look out belooooooww!!!!!,” the reason why it took time for me to come out is because God gave the world some more time to prepare for somebody like me. What is to be me?

Well, almost two weeks ago, a professor resigned from his post as program coordinator because of me. The college secretary told me how upset and tired the professor was, of overly stubborn, mischievous students like me. His basis for saying that? An email that I sent to my political party’s yahoogroup, which the losing party in the last student council polls was able to access by misrepresentation or by false pretensions.

Among the contents of the email is this question:

sabi nung isang taga 2 floor: “akala niyo absent ako no? nag commute lang ako kasi coding ang sasakyan ko.” "Tanong: wala bang na-e-exempt sa number coding ng MMDA? Di ba applicable sa transportation sector ang kasabihang “respect the vintage—este elders?”

When he asked who I was referring to in that question, I looked in his eyes and said, “honestly sir, that’s you.” My bold honesty shocked him, I thought he would die of a heart attack. Or I wished he did at that moment. My lawyer friends told me I shouldn’t have admitted anything since the burden of proof is on the professor. But I find comfort in brazen honesty. Moreso, I wanted him to know what I really thought of him —that as program coordinator and faculty, he is biased for the losing party, whose members always hanged out with him in his faculty room. These are the very same people who vowed to make us regret that we ever won in the last student council polls.

He scolded me for my behavior saying that as a graduate student I should’ve acted maturely. I was tempted to tell him that from time to time, the five-year old me surfaces. And at that very minute, I saw myself in pig tails, and with a Barbie doll.

I apologized for offending him and asked what I should do to appease him of his anger. He ended the confrontation with a warning that he will file charges against me for deliberate discourtesy to a faculty which according to him is punishable by expulsion. I was actually sincere when I said sorry. But having this cocky and condescending facade, I won’t blame the professor for filing charges against me instead of accepting my apology. Perhaps I should enroll in a course on delivering convincing apologies. Aside from my ex-boyfriends, guess who my other classmate will be? Who else but the sitting president of this freaking republic!

I have yet to receive summons from the student disciplinary tribunal of the university or from the faculty council. Surprisingly, I am not scared. Well for a second, the thought of being deprived of a master’s degree after slaving myself crazy to get good grades, struck fear in my ultra geek-y heart. But I’ve been here many times, the adrenaline rush refuses to kick in now.

During my last semester in undergrad, I was referred to as the resident bitch of my college. for what reason? I threw the department chairperson of journalism and the dean, my worst tantrums when they cancelled a class that I badly needed to graduate that sem.

You see, UP has this rule that for undergrad classes, the enrollees should be at least 15. otherwise, the class is dissolved into oblivion and your plans are once again messed up. however, UP also has this rule that graduating students must always be accomodated to classes. Invoking the latter rule, I lobbied at the dean’s office the whole week and pulled some necessary strings. And voila! amidst the dwindling state subsidy to the university, they opened a class, paid the professor’s salary–with just me–as the lone student.

Learning from that incident, the college came up with a resolution which they printed on those gigantic papers and posted on all bulletin boards that from that time on, that class will only be offered during summers. at that point, all i can say was, "whatever!"

It is not my intention to be like this. It’s just that, these things do happen. I just always happen to be there when they do. In fifth grade, I remember finding myself in the principal’s office again, after sending a box of dora rat killer—to a sixth grader that I then totally despised. That was a week after I disrupted a catholic mass in school, with my hysterical shrieks after seeing a gigantic rat.

I did a lot of these things in high school, but I can only come up with two. During my senior year, I had conflicts over policy implementation with the city schools superintendent, the regional director of GSP and some other old but powerful people. According to those old people, they cannot believe how stubborn I was and how I had the utter gall to question their policies. The conflict lasted two months. It ended when they stopped considering my opinions and went on with their questionable policies. When I look at it now, I did lose in that one. But not without giving them delicious migraine and menacing gray hair.

It’s funny how I was always made to host school programs in high school. During one United Nations’ celebration, towards the end of the program, I declared that there won’t be classes the following day. After that announcement, the gymnasium full of students and teachers exploded into pandemonium and went uncontrollably ecstatic, then left immediately.

Two minutes after my announcement, a very shocked principal approached me and asked with all the niceness that she can muster: “who told you that? There will be class and work tomorrow My first reaction: YIKES! Second reaction: grab the freaking classmate who gave me the announcement and slap him stupid. So once again, I found myself, in the principal’s office, this time with all the year level coordinators, my class adviser, guidance counselor and if I remember right, the school chaplain.

For some reason, the school never called my parents despite all the mayhem that I caused. They were probably thinking, my parents could be worse. But if they did ask my parents to come, my dad would probably say something like: “I know my daughter, that’s why we put her in your school,” or my mom would say: “Pagbigyan n’yo na, she’s my youngest kid.”

My parents are very much aware of my attitude and how it can get me into trouble. But they always knew that I take responsibility for my actions—whatever the cost. Plus, they are confident of my problem solving skills. Remember, at zero age, with my size and with my umbilical cord tangled around my neck, which made breathing very difficult for me, and with my mom almost giving up in the middle of the normal delivery, I managed to wiggle myself out into the world. Of course, God, who in His infinite wisdom knew He had something to do with a headache like me, helped me get out. Big time. At this point, I’m digressing.

So whatever happened in the principal’s office is now entirely blurry as it had been nine years. What I remember well is that, the following day, the school was almost empty because the announcement spread to almost everybody. Some members of my class wanted to disown me for my notoriety. But some saw it as signs of things to come. Heck, by declaring a holiday, I did what only a president of the republic or a mayor of a city can do.

Yikes…if my misadventures were signs of things to come, don’t you wish you were born some other life time?