MIBF, Lourd de Veyra, etc.

Last summer, my brother took me to this marketing firm, which is besides the point of this blog entry. We were waiting for the opener, the supposedly rich-and-successful host that would accommodate us in our eight-hour stay. To keep myself from ennui (yes, I did find the event lackluster, miss), I bought Lourd de Veyra's Superpanalo Sounds!, which, due to my utter ignorance, I have not heard about until then. Read the book with so much pathos (didn't even think that was possible), and I must say that it gave me massive insight in writing for the CPMA's that summer because until I had read the first few pages of the novel, I had been debating in my head whether I should continue writing the piece or not. There were no regrets since.

I wish I could have told that to Mr. de Veyra yesterday, when I got my book signed at the MIBF at the Mall of Asia. What happened was that, I tried to catch up on the initial book-signing schedule, which was at 1 PM, but then the inclement weather hindered what would have been an early travel, thus delaying my arrival for a good one hour (this would actually be a good, long story to write about - maybe next time). So I got there. And I was crushed. To the bone. Spent a few more minutes slacking around the SMX Convention Center, bumping on the hundreds of people who attended, continually brushing past Ramon Bautista's booth, which more or less looked like the entrance to Disneyland with all those people lined up to have their books signed. Rambled some more...

...but then what's this? He was still there! Fuggit, like he just arrived!

So there he was, in front of me. "Mga taga-Letran kayo, 'no?" he asked. And, on the account that I am such a boring, awkward brat, I only stared, mouth agaped, at the presence that was Lourd de Veyra - with all those things that I wanted to say, never coming to pass. It suddenly makes me wonder if things would have turned out differently had I not known about the man as I hadn't before I had bought Superpanalo Sounds!.

Bottomline is this: Lourd de Veyra signed my book, crossed out the dedication, "Again for Marjorie" like I told him to. Then he wrote, "Para que Katrina y Bettina, Orgulloso de ti de historia, <3 Lourd", and below that, "Arriba". This was so sweet of him. His partings word to us? "May taga-Letran na umutang sa'kin. Hindi ko na maalala yung pangalan." Ha ha, wth right? Then, he thanked me and my sister. And, we went out, without yet coming to full circle with what in actuality just happened. Of course, we saw him again a little later outside the convention, when we were looking for something to eat. It looked as though he was leaving.

So that's it. It was the right time to have that book signed, no matter what Bet says. There was a chain of events that led us to that moment, that's what I believe. For example, how come we still caught Lourd despite the excruciatingly long commute under the storm, despite it already being 3:30 PM when he had supposedly left an hour ago? You know. Maybe I will be able to meet Lourd de Veyra again, and maybe then, I wouldn't be so dumbstruck. Maybe then, I'd get to hear the answer to why he killed Vic and Dax in his book.

Maybe, I'll just sit this one out and play some Pokemon. No regrets.