JessicaRulestheUniverse.com

After I bought the cockroach traps in the supermarket I went up to National Bookstore to see what was new. I was there on Wednesday, but stocks change fast. A few days earlier there was a stack of hardcover copies of Moondogs, a novel set in the Philippines, written by Alexander Yates who’d gone to IS Manila; now I couldn’t find any.

Bingo: the trade paperback of Jennifer Egan’s A Visit From The Goon Squad, which wasn’t there two days earlier.

I was prowling among the shelves, hoping the new Alan Hollinghurst had turned up, when I heard two senior citizens discussing movies. In Makati City senior citizens can watch movies for free; whenever I go to the movies in the early afternoon I’m surrounded by 60-year-olds.

“Ano’ng pinanood mo?” (What did you watch?) said Old Man # 1.

“Yung pelikula ni Brad Pitt, ano ba yung title, Living Tree,” (That Brad Pitt movie, Living Tree) Old Man # 2 replied. He meant Tree of Life.

“Ay pangit yon,” (That’s bad) said Old Man # 1.

“Hindi yon pangit!” (It is not!) Old Man # 2 bristled. “Kailangan kasi ng talino! Dapat kang mag-isip habang nanonood!” (It requires intelligence! You have to use your head while you’re watching it!)

“Ah,” said Old Man # 1, backing away.

“Maganda ang Living Tree!!” (Living Tree is beautiful!) Old Man # 2 followed him. He may not remember the title correctly, but he knows his movies.

For a second I thought I had caught a time warp and seen my future (If I’d suddenly changed genders like Virginia Woolf’s Orlando).