History In Denim

August 28, 2008.

            “Of all things that could have happened, why this?”

            Three pairs of eyes homed in on the girl sitting with her back to the wall. As the wind continued to blow over the grassy, sunlit courtyard outside the Yenko Hall at St. John the Baptist University, Ida Almario pulled back the stray strands of hair that fell into her eyes. “You know, it’s not thatfunny,” she said petulantly, looking at her companions.

            Next to her, Mark Lorenz stretched out his long arms before giving Ida a sideways glance. “Every time I see you, you have some long, horrible tale of dread to tell,” he pointed out as an amused smirk began tugging at his lips.

            Ida slapped his arm. “You wouldn’t laugh if it happened to you.”

            “That nail didn’t hurt you, I hope?” Mark’s cousin Nicolai asked more concernedly, giving Mark a warning look. “I mean, it looked pretty sharp.”

            “No, no. It’s not as if I sat on it. Now that would have been an emergency. I just walked by,” Ida said, drawing her knees up to her chest. She was aware of the still moist earth not far from her feet; it had rained after all the night before.

            “Then what is the problem?” Charlize Sanchez asked, throwing up her hands.

            Ida looked her best friend in the eye. “These are my mission pants, remember?”

            Charlize dropped her eyes by way of understanding. Mark looked puzzled for a moment before realization dawned on his face. Only Nicolai scratched his head perplexedly. “Mission pants?”

            Ida nodded. “I never told you about them, didn’t I?”

            “Ida, are these the same pants that you said you had since first year high school?” Mark asked.

            Ida nodded. “Yeah, so?”

            Mark looked her over. “And you’re already a college sophomore?” he teased.

            “One more “shorty” joke, Mark Lorenz, you’ll live to regret it.”

            “Alright, stop it, you two,” Charlize said, holding up a hand. “Though it is funny that the pants have lasted this long. Remember how you came upon them, Ida?”

            Ida nodded as she picked at a loose thread. “How could I have forgotten?”

000

            The rain had been falling hard that afternoon, an oddly bleak one for the summer of 2003. The parking lot outside the bazaar on Wilson Street was already covered in a thick grayish ooze by the time Ida and Charlize, then both only fourteen years old, had clomped across to safety.

            “Maybe this was not such a good idea,” Charlize said, pointing to the streaks of mud that stretched down her calves. “I won’t wear a skirt again next time we go shopping.”

            Ida only shrugged before wringing out her sodden ponytail. “Mom told me that it’s more practical to wear skirts when looking for pants. It saves you the time.”

            Charlize had not heard this, since her gaze already drifted off towards the stalls. “Hey Ids, is 300 pesos reasonable for pants?”

            “More than reasonable, I s’pose,” Ida said, trailing after Charlize towards the haphazard display. The still-pungent aroma of fresh denim assailed her nostrils, making her feel a little queasy. However, Ida perused the selection till at last her hands closed around a pair of stretch jeans with flowers and butterflies washed into the fabric.

            “Too flashy for me,” Charlize scowled.

            “Hey, if it fits, I’m getting it. I need clothes for the trip we’re taking up north,” Ida said, disappearing into the small changing stall in the corner. As she pulled on the pants, she felt the denim fall around her legs as if they were already familiar with them. She thrust her hands in the pockets, hoping that they would be deep enough to hold a phone, an ID, and other sundry items when she would be hopping about on mountain trails en route to the villages she and her friends would be teaching in. The flared legs of the jeans were a little long, with the hems almost obscuring her sneakers. Still, Ida figured she had at least two more years till they got too short to pass for bellbottoms.

            “Well, what do you think?” Ida asked, stepping out of the stall. “Good enough for a mission trip?”
            
            Charlize nodded approvingly. “Looks good on you, at least. I can’t get away with something like that,”

            “I’m sure you’ll find something that will also survive the mountains and the rivers,” Ida said, drawing the curtain again to change back into her skirt. “And they’d better be easy to wash, by the way.”

000
            Ida had no way of knowing though that not all stains could have been obliterated in the laundry. By the time the summer of 2005 rolled around, there were already more marks on the jeans than the old butterflies and flowers.

            Still, no one in the train of volunteers dared to comment on that fact while painting the houses in Sitio Crisolita. Although the noontime sun was baking the metropolis, it was not enough to fully dry the pockets of mud still lurking in the nooks and crannies of the slums. Ooze mixed with spilled paint and drying concrete left by the volunteers who were working their way from one end of Sitio Crisolita to the other. Among them was Ida, who at one point had been picking her way through a debris-filled alley, taking care not to let her still wet paintbrush touch anyone or anything. She cringed as she noticed the fraying hems of her pants dipping into the blackish murk that was fast leaking into her sneakers.

            “Coming through!” a voice shouted from up the alley. Ida had barely enough time to jump aside as several boys pushed a wheelbarrow down the tight space. However, in her attempt to escape being hit, she landed right into a pile of garbage. Paint from the brush splattered everywhere, even into Ida’s hair and her clothes.

             “Yikes! Are you alright, sis?” one of the boys called, running back to her.

            Ida glared at the boys as she got to her feet. “Oh crap…” she groaned, looking at the cream streaks on her yellow shirt and her jeans. She put her hands akimbo as she glowered at the other volunteers. “Why don’t you be more careful next time?”

            “Sorry sis,” the first boy said, offering her a rag to wipe her face with. Ida swore under her breath as she found black smudges on the rag after passing it over her brow and her cheeks.

            By this time, Charlize and the other teenagers in their team appeared at the other end of the street. “What happened here?” someone asked.

            Ida forced a smile on her face. “Occupational hazards,” she said matter-of-factly, pulling the last traces of mud out of her hair and off the now colorful fabric of her pants.

000

            “Of all days to be on duty, why during the school fair?”  Ida thought as she adjusted the strap of her camera. Mentally, she cursed her fellow writers who had not been able to show up in time for their shifts in the press team. “When I should be with Charlize and our other senior friends, scoping the crowd and just enjoying the night!” she noted vehemently. It really did not help that she knew that some of her friends had brought over acquaintances from other schools, people who Ida was hoping to get to know. Sometimes, Ida mused, school fairs were just really huge acquaintance parties.

As the band began to play on the small stage in the outdoor basketball court of Our Lady of Angels High School, the still-petite girl searched for a good vantage point to get photos of the performers. She could think of several places off the bat, but she knew she would either put herself in danger, or risk being too visible.

            Ida pursed her lips as she contemplated a dirty mud puddle right in her favorite photo spot under the trees. “Can’t risk ruining these pants again,” she whispered. After that little misadventure in Sitio Crisolita, she and her friends had gone on other building excursions in different sites across Metro Manila. She had not gone on another out of town mission trip since she was fourteen, but in the last two years, she had gone on smaller missions also within the city. Still, she managed to come away with more patterning on her jeans, which by now had lost their hems entirely.

            A light breeze blew, stirring up the still February air. Ida pushed her brown cap down more tightly on her head and untangled her press ID. She picked up her tripod and her notebook and headed towards the left of the stage, where the band lounge was situated. She could see some steps there that she knew promised a good view of the goings-on in the basketball court. More conveniently, there was a plant box where she could just set down her stuff while she worked, and the steps led right to the band lounge, where she was supposed to meet her team later. Best of all, the place was pretty high up, away from the mud that still lurked on the fairgrounds.

            However, when she neared the vantage point, she caught sight of a gangly boy sitting right on the plant box. “A boyfriend of one of my classmates, I bet,” Ida groaned inwardly. A closer inspection revealed however that the stranger was quite alone and clearly just there for the view. Mustering up all the audacity she had, Ida walked faster towards the steps, stepping into the grime several times.

            She walked up to the visitor and nudged his arm gently. “Um, excuse me, I need to set up the camera,” she said, fighting to keep her voice from coming out in a squeak. Much to her surprise, the boy wordlessly moved to another spot a little bit away from the planter.

            As Ida set up the tripod, she could not resist sneaking a glance at this stranger. He was wearing a crisp polo shirt and relaxed khakis. His light brown eyes were deep yet somewhat merry, and his dark hair was a little unruly and stood up in some directions, giving Ida the impression that he probably was just about her age, or maybe at worst, a year older.

            “Is it okay if I stay here?” he suddenly asked. Now all of a sudden, Ida was aware of those brown eyes taking her in. She felt her cheeks grow hot as she remembered what she was wearing: ratty, paint-stained jeans, a red t-shirt emblazoned with “Do You Hear the People Sing?” dirty sandals, and a mud-brown cap that completed the incongruity of the entire ensemble.

            Still, she found that smiling came rather easily to her. “I s’pose so,” she said. The young man nodded almost imperceptibly and fell silent. Ida breathed a sigh of relief as she began to take pictures of the band onstage, working out angles and tweaking with lighting, almost oblivious to the music in her ears, the mud drying on her sandals or even to the presence of her fellow on-looker.

            At last, when the band finished, Ida switched off her camera and fished a small tape recorder out of her pocket. “Time for the interview,” she said to herself as she packed up her gear and headed for the band lounge to meet the performers for an exclusive interview.

            “Mark! Where have you been?” another schoolboy shouted to the boy left standing near the planter just as Ida closed the door to the band lounge. It would not be for another year that she would actually learn to connect the name to the face.

000

            Now, Ida snapped the faded threads in her hand, feeling the worn softness of the denim near her ankle. “So what happened after then?” Nicolai asked.

“Charlize and I graduated, then went here for university,” Ida said. “Then it was sometime before we met up with you guys. I suppose more than five years is quite a stretch,” she said resignedly. “I just wish it hadn’t happened so publicly, you know?”

            “Hey, consider it a new start. New pants, new life,” Nicolai said. “I mean, look where you are now, right?”

            Ida felt her face light up with a smile, a more genuine one at last, as she took in her surroundings and the faces of the people with her. “It’s a far cry from those days, but still comforting enough” she reflected, noticing the mud that had still gathered all the same under her fingernails. “Maybe so.”

            Charlize picked at her shoelaces. “I’ll take you shopping again, Ida. After class?”

            “Why not?” Ida shrugged as the bell suddenly rang, piercing the afternoon quiet.

            Mark gathered up his books. “Ida, we’d better make it quick. We have classes at the other end of the school, remember?”

            Ida swallowed hard. “There’s just one problem though, Mark.”

            “And?”

            Ida’s face went scarlet. “How the heck am I going to get up??”