I heard an old song on the radio on my way to work this morning. It was Jon Bon Jovi’s Bed of Roses. (Well, it isn’t really that old, but these times the number one song changes every week, and gone were the days when you could remember a song with a year.)
I had to smile, because I remembered that song being played in the dances in my hometown, when I was maybe sixteen. The dances happened about four times a year: on Valentine’s Day, during the town fiesta, Halloween, and before New Year. The dances were usually sponsored by the Senior Citizens, those grand old ladies who collect the tickets at the hall entrance, sell nuts and candies, and watch like hawks over the gyrating teenagers on the floor. The dance hall was usually the covered basketball court in the town plaza, with loudspeakers set up on all four corners and glittering disco balls strung on wire along the ceiling. They would play four or five dance tunes to “rock with,” and the lights would flash, and then a couple of love songs for the “sweet” part, where the lights would be dimmed. It was sufficiently dark to pull your dancing partner a bit closer during the love songs, but not too dark that the watching grandmothers would see if you actually tried to kiss.
Those small-town dances were occasions for the teenagers to officially mingle, when the boys-turning-to-young-men who were away at college in Manila could come home and see which of their friends’ little sisters actually grew up pretty, and those little rituals of courtship could be done in a relaxed, friendly manner. In those dances a girl could refuse to dance a sweet song with you, and you knew she was turning you down, but you could still keep your face in front of your gang and say no big deal. That was lots better than suffering through the formal “ligaw” one evening in the girl’s living room, with the girl’s grandmother glowering from the kitchen, and you couldn’t say anything better than “Isn’t the moon beautiful tonight?” In little towns, when you court a girl, not only her whole family knows, they have also investigated your ancestry, and her girlfriends would have listed down all the misdemeanors you have done since preschool.
In those dances, you were allowed to run a little bit wild (but remember the watching grandmothers). You could step out a while and freshen up in some friend’s house, drink spiked punch or a bottle of beer shared three ways, then come back to dance the night away. And it was like being Cinderella. The party would be tapering off by one a.m., and the wise ones would leave before their grandmothers could appear at the edges of the dance floor, toting flashlights. It was total embarrassment to hear an announcement like this over the loudspeakers:
“Could Jane please come to the door? Her grandmother would like to go home now.”
I remember that after those dances, my sister and I would stay out awhile with friends, boys allowed, outside our gate. We’d sit there, slightly drunk, playing the guitar, playing cards, eating junk food, exchanging stories, letting all that good dancing energy ebb away before we parted. My own grandmother knew, and understood that such things were necessary if you wanted to stay sane in a house with teenagers who wouldn't stay exactly innocent.
At sixteen you didn’t care about Fidel Ramos or Bill Clinton being president, or that the exchange rate is 27 pesos to a dollar, or that Mayon Volcano erupted. You cared that Jurassic Park was a big hit, and that your mother did not allow you to watch Schindler’s List (but you watched it anyway and was properly sickened), and that Whitney Houston’s I Will Always Love You will be dedicated to your current boyfriend, if you had one. And on the radio, there’s Aerosmith and Radiohead and Ace of Base and Cranberries and Jon Bon Jovi.
“I wanna lay you down on a bed of roses… for tonight I sleep on a bed of nails…”
You remember a song like that blaring from the loudspeakers of your old hometown’s dance hall on a summer night, and you so young with your high school crushes and rose petals pressed between your diaries, you finding out that the boy who you didn’t dare believe likes you actually likes you, you slightly drunk with spiked punch and good friends and happiness… Oh, baby, you can almost believe that love lasts forever.
I had to smile, because I remembered that song being played in the dances in my hometown, when I was maybe sixteen. The dances happened about four times a year: on Valentine’s Day, during the town fiesta, Halloween, and before New Year. The dances were usually sponsored by the Senior Citizens, those grand old ladies who collect the tickets at the hall entrance, sell nuts and candies, and watch like hawks over the gyrating teenagers on the floor. The dance hall was usually the covered basketball court in the town plaza, with loudspeakers set up on all four corners and glittering disco balls strung on wire along the ceiling. They would play four or five dance tunes to “rock with,” and the lights would flash, and then a couple of love songs for the “sweet” part, where the lights would be dimmed. It was sufficiently dark to pull your dancing partner a bit closer during the love songs, but not too dark that the watching grandmothers would see if you actually tried to kiss.
Those small-town dances were occasions for the teenagers to officially mingle, when the boys-turning-to-young-men who were away at college in Manila could come home and see which of their friends’ little sisters actually grew up pretty, and those little rituals of courtship could be done in a relaxed, friendly manner. In those dances a girl could refuse to dance a sweet song with you, and you knew she was turning you down, but you could still keep your face in front of your gang and say no big deal. That was lots better than suffering through the formal “ligaw” one evening in the girl’s living room, with the girl’s grandmother glowering from the kitchen, and you couldn’t say anything better than “Isn’t the moon beautiful tonight?” In little towns, when you court a girl, not only her whole family knows, they have also investigated your ancestry, and her girlfriends would have listed down all the misdemeanors you have done since preschool.
In those dances, you were allowed to run a little bit wild (but remember the watching grandmothers). You could step out a while and freshen up in some friend’s house, drink spiked punch or a bottle of beer shared three ways, then come back to dance the night away. And it was like being Cinderella. The party would be tapering off by one a.m., and the wise ones would leave before their grandmothers could appear at the edges of the dance floor, toting flashlights. It was total embarrassment to hear an announcement like this over the loudspeakers:
“Could Jane please come to the door? Her grandmother would like to go home now.”
I remember that after those dances, my sister and I would stay out awhile with friends, boys allowed, outside our gate. We’d sit there, slightly drunk, playing the guitar, playing cards, eating junk food, exchanging stories, letting all that good dancing energy ebb away before we parted. My own grandmother knew, and understood that such things were necessary if you wanted to stay sane in a house with teenagers who wouldn't stay exactly innocent.
At sixteen you didn’t care about Fidel Ramos or Bill Clinton being president, or that the exchange rate is 27 pesos to a dollar, or that Mayon Volcano erupted. You cared that Jurassic Park was a big hit, and that your mother did not allow you to watch Schindler’s List (but you watched it anyway and was properly sickened), and that Whitney Houston’s I Will Always Love You will be dedicated to your current boyfriend, if you had one. And on the radio, there’s Aerosmith and Radiohead and Ace of Base and Cranberries and Jon Bon Jovi.
“I wanna lay you down on a bed of roses… for tonight I sleep on a bed of nails…”
You remember a song like that blaring from the loudspeakers of your old hometown’s dance hall on a summer night, and you so young with your high school crushes and rose petals pressed between your diaries, you finding out that the boy who you didn’t dare believe likes you actually likes you, you slightly drunk with spiked punch and good friends and happiness… Oh, baby, you can almost believe that love lasts forever.
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