There was no one to commandeer you to put down the hammer,
get down from that roof, leave the repair of the ceiling to me,
leche! that’s not a job for a girl! It was the best setup in the world!
Karen Kaye Rivero
Being born and raised in infamous Basilan Island has its advantages. You get to play inside army tanks, you get to learn Tausug and you get to drive at eleven years old.
But being born and raised without a father is even more amazing. One grandmother, one mother, and two sisters are all you have, and it’s the best setup in the world!
There was no father, no uncle, no brother, or houseboy to tell you what is safe and not safe, what you should or should not do. No one was there to commandeer you to put down the hammer, get down from that roof, leave the repair of the ceiling, of the kitchen door to me, leche, that’s not a job for a girl.
You thought that it was natural, and that this is the best setup in the world. You took it for granted that your mother had to work doubly hard. You even thought it was cool to be on a scholarship, even if the nuns insisted to take you off the roll because your Chinese middle name betrayed you. You looked up to your glamorous and feisty grandmother, but feared her at the same time. You would later learn that this is how it feels to fear a father.
The male form, manner and temperament were so foreign to you, so alien, that you simply never thought that they should have a space in your young life. Why, there was even a time that even the dogs you had at home were all bitches. No single male, human or animal, imposed its presence on you.
So as a result you and your sisters grew up braver than most. You did not cower when warning shots were fired in the middle of the night. You long remembered that one shot meant ‘warning!’, two shots meant, ‘siege!’ three shots meant ‘fire!’. You did not wait for strong male arms to scoop you up from your bed and carry you off into the moonlight; you and your sisters were dreadfully organized. You were the first ones to run down the stairs at the first shot. You knew exactly what to do:
Eldest Sister would be stationed at the gate, and would drive the jeep if Mommy wasn’t around. Middle Sister’s task was to wake Grandmama up, and help her onto the vehicle. Youngest Sister’s order was to check the premises, peer from the balcony, and yell out information to Ate at the gate.
Like a military unit you moved without fear, with only the intent to survive and protect each other buffeting you.
You grew up like this, doing things on your own; no chivalrous knights needed nor wanted in your all-female household.
That is why, when you finally left that small town in that small island for a college education on another scholarship, you could not understand why in the world people around you should consider you different!
They would be surprised that you didn’t need a companion for your bathroom breaks; they would be amazed you didn’t need the school guard to usher you across the street. They were so intrigued how you could be so comfortable being alone walking or sitting in a corner! So what, you thought.
Just the same, your classmates used you as an example in your Speech class: “Do you agree that children in father-absent families have a harder time in life?,” went one discussion one day. And when they started whispering, nodding their heads, and said, “Well look at Karen, she grew up without a father, and she seems okay;” you failed, for the life of you, you failed to stop from laughing like a hyena right across their struck faces.
You had them start thinking there must be something wrong, something wrong in the world that went on.
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