Ninoy and 31 years ago

February 25, 1986 united us as one people. What had led to it was August 21, 1983. Ninoy had warned about an angered carabao whose patience has run out.

 

Tita Aurora Aquino was with us on August 7, 1983, in the home of son-in-law Esto and daughter Maur Lichauco. We all-knowing wise men and bright boys said "naaaah": she had said Ninoy would be shot on arrival. Her basis, "kutob ng Ina."

 

I met Ninoy only once, in 1982, at Harvard and in his Newton home. The first time he called me in Boston, he made me feel like a long-lost friend. "Reneeee!"

We drove to his place in Newton along Commonwealth Avenue. (The Aquinos had no driver but had a maid.) He changed to something comfortable, kicked off his shoes and "laid back." There I was to be with him for the next nine hours or so. Mind-blowing. I spoke from time to time so he would not mistake me for part of the furniture.

 

      In the background was some plain housewife, crocheting.

 

      Ninoy obviously had done some homework on MABINI, our lawyers' group, and me. He asked how my family was taking it, i.e., devoting a great deal of time to non-revenue, even risky, human rights cases. I told him my Dulce supported what I did, the important thing. I could not resist pointing out that she had obtained her master's degree just across the street, the Jesuits' Boston College which had given her, a board topnotcher, a two-year scholarship in social work.

 

      He talked of his past, his present and his future. He would repeatedly stress that, partly as a result of his prison experience and being strapped for cash, his public life was behind him. He had gotten elected youngest governor and senator in our history and - who knows? - perhaps would have been the youngest president of the country had not martial law been inflicted by Mr. Marcos. His detractors say he would have been our first dictator.

 

      He said he enjoyed the quiet life there. I later told others about his forswearing politics; they would smile a la Mona Lisa. There was that wistful catch to his voice, that faraway look, and which I now see in the prism of nostalgia's soft dusky afterglow, in the amber autumnal half-light as the sun dipped with its lambent flame emitting shafts of purple shades at eventide on that long cool Indian Summer day we talked at length with a panoramic view of beautiful Chestnut Hill.

 

      Would he consider teaming up with the Marcoses? He recalled that his father had helped a lot of people in World War II and was labelled a collaborator, which he tried to live down; Sr. passed away at 53 of a heart ailment - was it a broken heart more like? Jr. would rather not risk being so misperceived.

 

      There was one might suppose, providence in Ninoy's release. Did the fickle gods intervene in 1980? However that may be, his release on a deus ex machina basis has been at one a burden and a blessing. His monochromatic martyrized image emerged.

 

      He recalled that in 1977, Mr. Marcos had sent for him.

 

     MARCOS - You know, a thought occurred to me last night, while I was thinking of our meeting today. Suppose I let you right now, what will you do?

 

     AQUINO (surprised) - Well, I don't know, brod, I have not given it a thought really as I have not been allowed to read or hear or watch the news all these years. Maybe what I will do is to go out to the people and ask if they are happy under your administration. If they are, then I will just keep quiet. However, if they are not, then I will probably try to lead them against your administration.

 

     MARCOS - You know, in a way, I envy you?

 

      AQUINO - Why, brod?

 

     MARCOS -You have all the time to read the great books, the classics, the finest literature. Also I am still struggling for mine.

 

     AQUINO - Well, my years in prison also made me realize who my very few real friends are. How about you, brod, do you know who your real friends are?

Ninoy had probably let loose a shaft and sensing it found the mark, twisted it.

 

When we met, Ninoy was serious, he was light, he would touch on matters of state and the latest gossip on the members of the ruling elite and would punctuate most anything with "Jeez." In the end, he put himself where his mouth was: "The Filipino is worth dying for."

I love mad and weird men, who see things that never were, and ask, why not? After Ninoy was "salvaged," I got to know Cory better, to the point that in late '85, when she decided to run for Prez, she picked me as her spokesperson. Poor judgment? I could make her laugh when I gave serious advice but, when I would tell a joke, she'd implement it. Which may help explain why we did not do better.

 

Seriously, August 21, 1983 was not the end. It was not the beginning of the end. It was the end of the beginning - Churchill - of a struggle that began on September 23, 1972. The effect is caught in this poem by Kristian Ostergaard.

     That cause can neither be lost nor stayed which takes a course of which God has made.

 

      And is not trusting in walls and towers, but

 

      Slowly grows from seeds to flowers. . . .

 

     Thereby itself like a tree it shows:

 

     that high it reaches as deep it grows;

 

     And when the storm are its branches shaking, it

 

      Deeper root in the soil is taking.

 

     Be then no more by storm dismayed,

 

     for by it the full-grown seeds are laid.

 

      And though the tree with its might it shatters,

 

      What then if thousands of seeds it scatters?

 

      Hindi ka Nag-iisa became our slogan or battlecry, and Tie a Yellow Ribbon, Bayan Ko and the Impossible Dream became more popular than seemed possible.