The Spinal Tap

[Depending on the sense of humor of the universe at the moment, these text things may or may not have appeared in a recent issue of the Adamson Chronicle]

Hi. My name is JB Lazarte. I’m what you may consider a self-absorbed, self-obsessed, anal-retentive, English Nazi slash editor slash netrepreneur slash selfish bastard. But before I became this, a million years ago, I was a self-absorbed, self-obsessed, anal-retentive editor-in-chief of the cool student paper you’re holding. Now you call it the Adamson Chronicle Murder Rooms: The Kingdom of Bones movie

. Back then, in a time when dinosaurs roamed and ate slow-moving animals, we just called it “the paper.”

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Ah, the 1990s. Good times. I was an easily frightened, impressionable freshman in 1993 when Arlene Villaluz-Paredes sort of told me to take the editorial board exam. Arlene was a hot new English professor back then, and I’m sure she still is now. That was second semester, maybe November 1993, when she tried to seduce me — “seduced” me with the idea of joining the paper. And because I was the sort of “retard” who said “yes” whenever people around me said yes, or killed frogs when other kids killed frogs, I didn’t need much convincing. In February of the following year, 1994, I took the exam. By May, I would receive the telegram (this was the state of the art before texting) informing me that I made it to the cut.

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Fast-forward three years later. In 1996, maybe November, I remember this one afternoon, I was all alone at the Penthouse’s terrace on top of SV Building. For those who don’t know it, the Penthouse was the office of the paper, so chosen in the same way the location of Medieval castles had been chosen. The relative isolation gave the paper a kind of independence, gave it some perspective, probably balls, too. I remember the smell of coffee from the mug in my hand, the briny late afternoon breeze from Luneta, the lengthening shadows of the Jai Alai building, and me thinking, “How in hell does one serve as the editor of this place?”

Then as now, it wasn’t easy to find the answers. You were practically just a kid. Sure, as an editor, you probably have some facility with language, but that wasn’t good enough. Here’s an idea: hit William Golding’s Lord of the Flies Lucky Numbers divx Caddyshack psp , pay special attention to how the children form some crude, even savage, kind of politics and self-government based on their instincts and early prejudices and fears, and you get the picture. The “savage insanity” of “managing” a supposedly independent student paper was, in many respects, very Lord-of-the-Flies-y. There you were, barely understanding the first thing about justice and journalism, and you already have the “ginormous” burden of being able to publish all your foolishness. Note that I used the word “ginormous” in a non-boobs-related context. Which means I’m actually serious.

Back then I had only been beginning to figure out the opposite sex and what to do with the opposite sex (to borrow a line from Butch Dalisay), but already I was supposed to “enlighten” other students. Keep them on their toes. Make them aware of the world they live in. Crazy shit.

There was much controversy surrounding my ascent to the “top position,” as everyone considered it then. I won’t bore you with the details, but let me just say it involved melodrama, some amount of money, broken chairs, somebody important getting untimely knocked up, screaming matches and tearful confessions, and a really ugly woman who was my associate editor.

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Even without the controversy, it was heady, sometimes oppressive, to find a moment and ponder the fact that you’re editing a student paper with much colorful history behind it. The Adamson Chronicle used to be so much respected. You enter a room anywhere on campus, you flash that Press ID, and ladies just begin throwing you their underwear! Alright, I’m exaggerating, but you get the picture. So for a totally awesome, incredibly charming 19-year-old kid that was me, it was a massive responsibility. It was also a good source of what scientists call “pogi points.” As editor, you called all the shots. The buck stopped with you. But of course, the sword was double-edged and it always dangled right above your head. You took care not to make mistakes. When you were unsure of what you were doing, you put up a good bluff and pretended confidence. But even with the best of intentions, you ended up doing only half of what you could have done, even less. And when the shit hit the fan, you stand up to take all of it.

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At least, that’s what I believe I did.

Fast-forward three years more. In February 1999, dinosaurs were “dying” and I among them. When I left, the paper was on the threshold of many changes, and much of these changes would eventually kill it. We were breeding some bad habits, and the paper was running out of useful talent. It was getting more and more eccentric, eventually becoming a “pariah.”

Then there was the matter of filthy money. Lots of it. I mean, it wasn’t enough for the publication, but more than enough for anyone who needed to buy his baby a can of milk.  Something silly like that. And depressingly regrettable.

Flashback, March 1997. My so-called “editorial board” was dominated by what people who study apes refer to as “dudes.” We were having fun at the Penthouse’s terrace. There might have been a bottle of hard liquor, a pack of fried peanuts, and some of us might already have been hammered. One of my editors, I don’t remember which, asked, “And what about the future?” Maybe I laughed at the question or maybe I responded to it by telling one of my painfully embarrassing sex jokes, but I do remember how we talked seriously after that. How some of us expressed certainty about the answers. The future seemed like a solid, well-paved, brightly lit road chiseled out of solid twenty-something sex -– for our individual lives and for the paper itself.

And then somebody said, “Like the Jai Alai building, the paper will stay on its feet forever.” Nobody laughed. Like with many of the things we believed in then, we thought it was true.

We took it for granted that we could always go back to that place, relive the moments, as easy as paying a friend a visit. We believed it could stay like that as long as we live, future “Chroniclers” just enjoying the nice things we’d leave for them.

And then I think I said, in a rush of optimism so common among us in those years, “Everything’s pretty solid.” Then a silence. Half-drunk, it was easy to stop talking. It was easy to just gawk at the views from the terrace. From this vantage point, everything seemed breathtaking. You’d think things would never end. And even tragedies, from that perspective, were so tiny they were unreal.

And then one of us stood up, took off his shirt, and shouted, “I’ll bet you all fifty pesos, I’ll jump of the edge. Dare?”

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{Image: Clayton Cubat}

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