Severe September

“Now I have no excuse to be grumpy, bossy and self-centered,” JR says on the evening of September’s last Sunday.

His lids are droopy, his skin sallow, and his body stooped, but he is never more relaxed and nice and kind—a look alien to us in the past four months while he reviewed for the bar exams.

The bar took all of his September Sundays—and ours, too. He pored over his law books, while we (kith and kin) prayed for him night and day. We never (or so we tried) as much as tell him any news that might distract his focus.

And now it is all over. We welcome him back. And the long wait for the results begins.

Every Sunday afternoon, the mood on Taft Ave. (La Salle is the venue of The Bar), cordoned off from vehicles, is festive and delightfully chaotic. Professors, students, relatives of the bar takers are there in droves, chanting and cheering the harassed, spent examinees as they emerge from the exam rooms. Whoever started this age-old tradition called Bar Op (operations) must be awarded a medal for creativity.

The night before that, the bar candidates are served hand and foot by their schoolmates and concerned friends in the hotels where they are billeted. In Ateneo’s case, it’s Sofitel Philippine Plaza. Then on the morning of the bar, the examinees are pampered with breakfast, last-minute legal opinions summarized on paper, and sent off in a special bus with prayers, blessings, and words of encouragement.

Back on Taft Ave. on that last Sunday afternoon: bands played, balloons danced, hands clapped, cameras flashed, banners waved, and people leaped and laughed. Waiting for JR on the sidelines, squashed between energized people of all kinds, I find God’s grace—sustaining all of those around us and those bar tortured souls before us.

“There’s JR,” JC nudges me. I look around to remind Tony to take his picture but he is lost in the crowd.

JR walks slowly with the rest of his compatriots, relief written all over his face. He animatedly talks to a similarly relieved, and refreshingly cute, girl to his left. He doesn’t look around. Like the rest of the examinees walking with him to the exit, he is in no hurry to go anywhere. He simply strolls. Again I find ample grace to savor the moment.

Severe September it might have been, but God’s merciful grace ended it all with anticipation of many good nights’ sleep, serene days, more smiles, and being our simple selves once again.