Look, it's Armani

He’s an ukay-ukay regular customer. My dad. My mother describes him as addict, but I’d like to veer away from her description to give my dad some respect, although I’m tempted most of the time to use the same word or another that is more lacerating and irreverent than that. He’s obsessed. That I believe is more accurate. And less vindictive.

It didn’t happen progressively. There was no defining moment, a turning point whatsoever. He acted just like that without at least giving us warnings or getting bigger closets to squeeze in all his stuff. I mean, he got so many they could almost displace my mother’s. Sometimes he would bring home a pair of jeans or a shirt. Sometimes a pair of shoes. Other times a belt. We couldn’t tell exactly what and when he would buy next. It all depends on the price and the new arrivals.

And boy, how he turned into an expert. While I can hardly guess how much a dress is, my dad knows definitely. He can even compare prices. Having gone to many stores, he knows that Ukay-Ukay A sells more cheaply than Ukay-Ukay B, but that its fitting room is not in good shape as B’s. There were even times his breaking news was not about the latest political blunders, but the newly opened ukay-ukay store in such and such street, or the on-going sale in such and such store.

“I spotted a pair of jeans, but I would wait for the sale. Its price would have dropped by then,” he would say of the sale, which usually is still a week to go.

“Who said it’s still there by then?” I would be tempted to say, but always decide not to. After all, he has waited for ukay-wide sales several times already and never been disappointed after finding whatever clothing he wanted still hanging invitingly.

My dad is frugal. He’s the type who doesn’t want to spend excessively even if he has the money to spare. He turns off the light when no one’s in the room. If he can tolerate the heat, he’d rather fan himself than turn on the electric fan. He eats leftovers, even those that have been in the freezer for more than three days. He sometimes eats them without reheating, leaving the microwave oven, which he still keeps in the box, completely useless. Shopping at ukay-ukay stores, therefore, is not much of a surprise. After all, they are a place where he could buy stuff usually worth thousands of pesos for a fraction of the amount.

What interests me, though, is not his ability to scour the whole of an ukay-ukay store for a piece worth a high school student’s allowance. My dad has impressively sophisticated taste. Sosyal, if I may say. A pair of jeans should be an Armani, the slacks Louis Vuitton, the shoes Salvatore Ferragamo. And there are other names he digs for, which I can’t remember, let alone spell.

For a good record, 8 out of his 10 purchases are branded. In fact, he buys anything signature, even those that are outdated they look like costumes for movies. I know they are called vintage. And in the fashion world, the word vintage is attached to gloriously glamorous, elegant, and exotic images. But these vintage clothes, some at least, don’t look flattering on my dad. He thinks otherwise, though.

“Are you sure you want to wear that?” I would ask, trying to define what year and season the piece was from. What, 70’s? 80’s?

I know that my dad has taken no special interest in vintage clothing. I know it for a fact. He doesn’t care what decade the piece was from, but he cares about the label on which the fashion god’s name is sewn. And I have come to realize that that’s the major consideration he has when buying a piece from an ukay-ukay store. Who cares if there is an obvious hole on the left leg of the jeans? Who cares if the shirt’s big on him? Who cares if he looks like he’s stuck in the 80’s? Who cares, really?

“Why, this is Armani,” he would say, fronting the mirror with the piece on, then slightly turning around to get a full view of his back. He would repeat probably more than three times it’s Armani or another whose-who name and justify why it was a good buy to, in my opinion, convince himself more than us.

“Look, it’s Armani. It is genuine.”

I get it. To my dad, sporting a signature clothing is sometimes more important than being connected to the rest of the fashion world. And it seems a single name outweighs the purpose of dressing. I would like to take it all from the viewpoint of an understanding daughter, but it kind of bothers me that he seems to overlook why humans dress in the first place. I almost regularly tell my dad no one in the streets would dare ask him who he is wearing and that people wouldn’t mind if it’s not Armani. He wouldn’t budge, and I take that as a hint that he’s not to abandon yet his usual trips to ukay-ukay stores.

Now he regularly receives text alerts from a certain ukay-ukay store. He read to us the message one day, an info-text of an upcoming sale. I can’t believe ukay-ukay stores have advertisements of that sort, but then again, this is the text era. My dad would reply with a simple “Thanks,” devoid of any excitement and anticipation. But in my mind, I see him smiling, looking round the store in search of an Armani. Or Ferragamo. Or Louis Vuitton. Or what-have-you’s.

An Epistle of Love

To my future,

Now that I write this, your identity is still unknown to me. I don’t even know if I have already met you. I am utterly clueless, although I sometimes wish you were already part of my circle. Regardless, I am hoping to be surprised when I finally meet you. I hope you also will be. You will be a pleasant surprise, a gift actually. A beautiful gift. An answer to my prayers. To my tearful cries. To my longings.

I have been waiting for you. For years. Quite abnormally long years. But I am patient. I have to be. I want you to find me spotless. Pure. Reserved. Yes, I have reserved myself for you. I won’t say, however, that I have been entirely faithful, although faithfulness while waiting is questionable because there is no one to be faithful to in the first place. But there is, I think. You. I have to be faithful to you. This is my choice. To wait for you.

It is not an effortless thing, I have to say. Because I’ve been tested several times and failed quite a few times, too. I battled with self-doubts, with self-pity, and every so often I questioned if you would ever come to find me. God says you will. And I trust Him with the intensity that I hope you have, too. Let’s trust God. Even though you are there and I am here, with our individual anonymity and the unknown future separating us, I know in my heart that God will cause us to meet someday. It will be a sweet thing, like finally locking the ends of a priceless necklace, keeping it secure, its diamond pendant radiating with the streaks of sunlight. I can’t help my excitement. But in the meantime, let’s wait.

Please be patient. I am being patient, though it requires too much of my strength. We will meet when God decides we are finally ready. I don’t want to go against God’s plan, and I know you feel the same way, too. Let’s obey. We will both be pleased if we allow God to work between us and unravel the love story He has already authored for you and me.

Right now, I know the Lord is still preparing us. For our meeting. For our union. And for every lovely thing He has for us. Indeed, it is the reason for this singleness. I often wonder why I have been in this season longer than many of my friends had. Do you often wonder, too? The only answer I have is because He wants us to be a testimony not only to our friends but also to other people, strangers even, who may have unfavorable opinion about love and marriage. The world needs models who can credibly demonstrate the rewards of waiting, and even if we didn’t plan to take that role, we were chosen. I want to be used you know, and if my, our, waiting is designed to create more impact and make our story more powerful, then I have no questions about it. In fact, it makes my heart glad. Because I also know that there will be a beautiful ending. A very beautiful ending to our singleness and an equally beautiful start to our togetherness.

I have to admit, though, that using us, we, and our is somewhat new to me. I have always been alone and I have never considered anyone to be part of myself. It has always been I, me, and my. So this is how it feels. It feels great. It feels as if you were here, next to me, watching me write you a letter, looking over my shoulders, peeking at every word that I put, holding my hand once in a while. But I can’t see your face. Until I see you personally, your face would always be a blank, hazy image. It’s okay. I have the rest of my lifetime to lock my gaze on that face God created with me in mind.

I have always loved you. I told that to a friend long ago, riding the train, with nothing to talk about. She probably didn’t see that coming and so doubted my feelings. She told me that this may not be the case, that I may not actually love you, that I loved only the idea of loving you or the idea of you. I pondered for a moment and thought that she may actually be right. No, I said. I love him. I love him even without knowing him. I love him even without knowing who he may actually be. I love him.

I didn’t convince her I know. Because if it weren’t me, if it were another person professing her affections for her unknown beloved, I would have scoffed at her. For who would believe in the idea of loving someone you haven’t met? Who would actually love an imaginary person? But to me, you are not imaginary. You are as real as anyone I know. Only you are not here. You are not with me. Yet. But that doesn’t give me any reason not to love you now.

Love is not just a feeling. Because if it is, I may have long ago abandoned the idea of us and have chosen to cling to someone else. But I did not. I chose to stay. Because love is a choice. If I didn’t love you, I would not have chosen to wait for you.

I believe it doesn’t require physical evidence to trigger love. I don’t need to see you to love you. It just happened. An occurrence even I can’t explain. And I don’t need to find reasons for feeling this way because I believe love demands no reason. You just love.

This is how I am toward you. And I will continue to wait for you until God says it’s time. You are part of neither my past nor my present, but you certainly will be part of my future, and to me, that’s better than enough. I will meet you. Soon. In God’s time. And we will be happy.

Lovingly,

Your future