gift

It was around 2:30 in the morning when I woke up and saw him sitting on the monobloc chair beside my bed. Light from a neighbor's house streamed through a window: his face was hidden in shadows, but I recognized his silhouette, exquisite cotton shirt and suspenders, and cane.

"Dr. Sulit?" I asked.

While driving home from his wake a couple of hours before, I thought of how I would miss him, the anesthesiologist who had been a pillar and in whose company I felt enervated, like I was on morphine. I didn't expect to meet him again so soon, though.

We spoke just like before. We talked about the woodcarvers of his hometown of Paete, his classmates, Locsin's lovely translation of Noli, the Baldemor brothers. He retold the story of how he spent ten years building his Greenhills house, one of my favorite houses in the world. It was the same as before- except that this time he no longer needed to open his mouth to talk to me.

Half-dreaming, I asked, "Dr. Sulit, why do people feel pain?"

Pain is a gift, his hoarse voice echoed in my head. It's because of pain that you know that something is wrong. Pain actually helps you live.

I sensed that he wanted something, but I was non-committal. I apologized for not having visited him as frequently as I would've wanted, explaining how Japanese class had taken up a lot of my time.

Ganyan ka naman, he said, sounding irritated but also proud. I am living the way he spent his life: by working hard to realize a unique vision of beauty and perfection.

As the pink sun rose outside the eastern windows, I thanked him for imparting his own vision to me: it was Dr. Sulit who transformed my vision of books from bound sheets of paper into three-dimensional pieces of art.

When he suddenly shifted in the chair, I sensed a discomfort that, in life, he never showed: it was a kind of power, being the rock that everyone depended on for solace.

"Doc, it'll be OK," I said anyway. "I'll say a prayer for you. Look at the light, go towards the light."

From my bed, I reached out to touch his hand, but felt only air.

Like a colorful dream that flickers briefly in the night, Benigno Sulit, MD, was gone.















Photo for Big Dipper by Lester Ledesma, UP Nurses' Home, 2006.