the houses of strangers
like a restless soul searching for home, i have probably lived in a dozen or two houses that were not my own, nor owned by my parents. i found out that houses were like lovers. they too can be the jealous type, cold and uncaring, nurturing, noisy, quiet. they too had their own distinct smells (food, body odor, cigarette smoke, freshly-laundered clothes, baby's breath, a flower in spring, the first rain in june), characters, and nuances. like men. the first house was in cebu. it was nineteen eighty four and i was fourteen, a freshman at the university, when i started staying at a strangers' house, surrounded by strangers (who became like family to me later on) all the time. it was an all male dormitory (though the owners decided to accept female boarders later on) and i was rooming with five other freshmen at the same school that i was enrolled in. i was a virgin. that is, at living in strangers' houses. on my first night, i could not sleep. i was not used to sl...