“‘Wag ka malungkot. Sa susunod na usap natin, nagda-drive na ako ulit.”
Even while laid up in a hospital bed, laboring through his words, my father was never very good at keeping still. It was a Saturday night, and as he often did while I lived overseas he called to talk to me about anything and everything.
The fact that my written words are published here is in large part thanks to the man who often espoused to me the pinnacle of automotive achievement that was the 1957 Ford Thunderbird. A man who would slide under cars in his youth and engine-swap a ’60s Benz during the ’80s from his garage.
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My dad wasn’t a car guy, but he made the effort to be one for me
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Driving was his therapy, and cars were a lifelong fascination he expected all of his children to take up by birthright. All of us spent hours in backyard talyers as he ran around talking the ears off of mechanics wearing sandos heaved up to their chests and tsinelas covered in grease. We would stay long enough for Papa to buy a round of gin bilog for the boys at sundown.
Of his four children, it was me who enjoyed being his sidekick to these quests. I didn’t care much for the mud on my shoes or the chickens clucking about the place, but seeing the intricacies of how cars worked and how they were fixed sparked that same lifelong fascination in me.
My shared passion with Papa started from teachable moments in my youth—how to clean and care for your vehicle, how to drive, how to keep an ear out for any unusual sounds—and turned into back-and-forth conversations and debates as I became an automotive journalist in my 20s. American versus Japanese. Idling warm-up versus get up and go. Now versus mamaya na.
He came from the school—and economic reality—of fixing as you go, whereas I lived in the idealized bubble of one-thousand-point preventive maintenance schedules.
I can still remember that conversation.
“Pa, malapit na maubos yung battery ng Innova.”
“Hindi, okay pa ‘yan. Ganyan talaga ‘yan. Ayusin mo pag-andar mo.”
A day or so later, I walked to the parking lot next to my then-office in Ortigas with an, ahem, friendly companion. We got in and, in the dead of a late weekday evening, we heard a click followed by nothing. I tried once more. It put in some effort, but the car let out a mere whimper.
“Tama ka pala, anak. Sige, tumawag ka delivery,” Papa conceded over the phone.
This same conversation and the same outcome would play out again about a year later. And again. And again.
For reasons known only to the Almighty, I was always the poor sap left alone to call for a battery delivery or run to our suki battery shop when a family car failed to turn over. I can still hear Papa telling me, “Unahin mo tanggalin ang negative terminal bago positive.”
Just days after that call from the hospital, I was driving Papa’s beloved Mitsubishi Montero Sport to his wake. Physical limitations had forced him to give up the wheel in his final months, and the SUV hadn’t been used much since.
From the first start, I knew the battery was on its way out.
“Hay, Papa. Sige, sana umabot hanggang matapos ang wake this week.”
I drove across town with my wife and my sister running one errand after the next, and each time the car sprang to life. As we got closer to where the wake was being held, my hands started to shake and my breathing got shorter.
“Hinga. Haharapin. Para kay Papa ito.”
I parked the Montero Sport and we started to make our way inside, but I realized the car was parked too far from the curb. I hopped back in the driver’s seat and pressed the push-button start.
Click. Sputter. Press. Click.
My shaking hands and short breath gave way to a roaring laugh. I hadn’t laughed since I got the bad news. My wife and my sister looked on, confused and, perhaps, a little bit concerned.
I entered the chapel and glanced upon Papa lying in a casket. I wasn’t there when he passed, and now the man I once thought to be the strongest, bravest, smartest in all the land running from one end of the talyer to the other, was gone.
My eyes welled up, but the smile from my battery mishap never left my face.
“‘Wag ka malungkot.” Somehow, he made sure of that.
I never did get to see my father driving again. But he left me one final gift from one gearhead to another that, in the moment, made all the sense in the world.
Happy Father’s Day, Papa.
