The river of life

"By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return."
Genesis 3:19

My memories flew back to the past when Roxanne sent me a message on Face Book early this week. Raxanne is a daughter of Primo Eniong, the husband of a distant cousin. She is now in Florida in the United States and saw my Face Book account when she searched for some long-lost relatives. Through her, I was able to contact Primo Eniong after more than two decades without any communication.
I first met Primo Eniong when a mutual friend recruited us to help run a newsletter during a Boy Scout Jamboree in a place called Mat-i in Romblon, a province in the heart of the Philippines. He was a teacher who was good at writing. At that time, I had just left the university and had decided to stay in Romblon for a rest after having contracted tuberculosis in the city.
I remember Primo Eniong as a jolly guy who would immediately engage you in a conversation as soon as you shook hands. Although I was the silent type prone to smiling than talking, I felt that he was a long-time acquaintance. We struck a fraternal bond, despite our age gap.
The moment we were introduced I instantly called him Iniong, a nickname for Eugenio. I added the appendage primo to his nickname when I learned later that he was the husband of a cousin, though a distant one. Primo is a Spanish word for a he-cousin, a tell-tale clue that the Philippines was once a colony of Spain.
We crossed path once again when he moved to Manila with his family to work as a writer for the Ministry of Information. I was already working for a newspaper then. Since we lived near each other, I often visited him in their rented apartment where we often talked about our jobs and daily lives over a few bottles of beer, but never about migrating to another country. Our occasional rendezvous ended when I moved to a new place far from where they lived.
Our latest meeting, this time in cyberspace, gives me a sense of disquiet to think that life is transient, fickle and fleeting that before we realize it we are already in the twilight years of our lives. Primo Eniong, who was in his 40s when we were in Manila, is now 75 and has retired in Canada without my cousin, Prima Nesia, also a teacher who died back home more than a decade ago.
Beyond the memories of Primo Eniong I could look back to the small village where I grew up in Romblon and where life was quite rustic. This makes me ponder about life as a river so calm on the shore but becomes turbulent and uncertain as we go mainstream. It's a river that won't allow us to go back to the past, however you wish to when the going gets rough, because you are ordained to finish the journey home.