The True Light

I tossed and turned on my bed last night, thinking of a myriad of things in one time. Pre-graduation jitters I guess. I wasn't able to sleep at all. I closed my eyes only to open them five minutes later. When the clock struck 3:20 AM, I gave up trying to send myself to sleep. I went to the bathroom and took a shower then waited for my sister to wake up for the make-up session. It was actually just like an ordinary day only I woke up insanely early. After hair and make-up courtesy of my make-up guru sister, I put on my pretty purple dress (the first dress EVER that I purchased from a store) and tried on my black academic gown. At that moment, everything was still so surreal, so hard for me to believe. In a few hours, I would be graduating with a degree and it's a big freaking deal. It's a big-ass effin' deal!

After going through hell with hair and make-up and waking up my brother, we finally left home and went to PICC where the ceremony is to take place. The processional started around 8 AM when my feet is already killing me. The Plenary Hall was inexplicably cold, cold enough to raise the hair at the back of my neck. I felt goosebumps as my mom held on to me like she's going to pass out any minute. I'm sure she doesn't want to believe what's happening as well. Her eldest child is graduating from college at last.

I felt like I attended a conclave. Everyone had their serious expressions on while the ceremony is taking place. I looked around, tried with my 75-50 vision to look for my siblings and uncle sitting a thousand seats away from my spot. Of course it was all in vain so I just sat quietly on my seat and waited for everything to be over. While the acid is busy tormenting the walls of my empty stomach, an usher called to me. He said I was supposed to tag my mom along and so we left our comfy seats. Although I already know why my mom and I are being called, I still don't know how I'm supposed to react. My mom held on to me, tears threatening to ruin her eye make-up and at that moment, I knew what's going through her head. I looked around once again, tried with all my might to see where my siblings and uncle were sitting.

And on the empty seats in between excited relatives of the graduates going crazy over taking pictures, I imagined my dad sitting with an expression that says, "Anak ko yan. Anak ko yan."

I plastered a heavy suppressor across my tear glands, sucked my stomach in and went up the stage with my mom holding my hand after Ma'am Ward announced, "And for the Lulu dela Rosa Award for Communication, Filipino Writing category, Pamela Trizia S. Castro." I heard some of my classmates applaud but in my head, sheer silence prevailed. Some of my professors smiled at me. I smiled back. As I took off my cap and Ma'am Florida gave me my medal, I squeezed my mom's hand. She looked at me with eyes that said, "I'm proud of you, anak." Then the flash of cameras went to blind us momentarily. Behind those flashes, I saw my dad smile from the heavens. I saved the tears.

After the ceremony, my uncle took us to an Eat All You Can restaurant in SM Mall of Asia. The delicious food was sure enough to make me ignore my murdered feet (because of the high-heeled shoes) and the hot weather. After three plates of good food, we went home and got back to bed, knocked out.

I really thought college was a torture chamber, a place where the word STUDYING is actually a combination of the words STUDENT and DYING. It's where professors teach with black whips studded with broken glass. It's where students cry bloody tears over books that have pages that never seem to run out and words that only the gods could understand. It's a place lit only by little torches screwed on moss-carpeted walls. It's dark and scary. It's the place I'd like to be in when air is not entering my lungs anymore.

College is sorrow but what's really funny about it is that it all actually made sense.

College made us bleed to train our systems to heal faster. Our professors taught us with whips to make our sights sharper. Our books talked to us with unusual words to widen our horizons and the little torches, dim their lights might be, made us search for the True Light harder.

This is the part when I say thank you to all my professors who never gave up teaching me the real lessons in life. Thank you to all my classmates who shared all the sorrows and joys with me for four years. Thank you to my one and only SUPERWOMAN MOM who never gave up on me despite everything. Thank you to my uncle who supported my studies financially. Thank you to my siblings who were happy enough to entertain me with a gag show every time I get worn out from school stuff.

And most of all, thank you Kuya for carrying my cross with me.

And as one story ends, so another begins.

Congratulations to all my fellow Quadricentennial graduates! May we all reach for our stars!

GODSPEED.