‘Broadband Bert’

The misty glare filling the predeparture area made me squint as I entered. This gave me a sort of eerie and lofty feeling, almost as if one were enveloped by a luminous cloud on a mountain peak, where one cannot sense where the light source is coming from. Everything seems all light and every now and then silhouettes of birds and rocks would ghostly appear.

As my sight grew accustomed to the light, I realized that there were very few people waiting for their flights. I slowly glided my way towards one of the boarding gates. As I was about to settle down, I noticed the big gray shadowy figure of a man. There was something familiar about him and even more when I noticed how his stubby fingers where rhythmically shuffling through a chain of wooden beads: a rosary. It was Bert.

“Bert!” I approached him. “What brings you here?”

“Father.” He slowly stood up and cast a gigantic shadow around me. He greeted me with the trademark of his wide perennial smile. For a second, it seemed we were the only ones in the place. Then I woke to the firm grip of his handshake squeezing my fingers. “What brings you here, Father?”

“Sometimes, you know, one cannot really say since we’re all traveling.” I massaged my traumatized fingers.

“I also think that way,” he said pensively. “Someone in the ground crew must have left a gate open and let the fog in. The rays of the sun mingled with the mist really give a heavenly effect.” He smiled again.

“I didn’t really think of it that way, I can still feel the ground and the seat,” I teased him and took my seat.

“Did you ever wonder what heaven is like, Father?”

“Not really, ’sides they say it’s a surprise, right?”

“Yup, but I’d like to think of it like this: waiting in such a calm, serene and quite place. Did you notice the PA system is broken and no TV sets seem to be working?”

I didn’t realize that until Bert pointed it out to me. “I guess you’re right, Heaven must be something like this, or at least its waiting room.”

BEEP, BEEP, BEEP! His cell phone sounded.

“Excuse me, Father,” Bert reached into his pocket to retrieve the phone.

I was always amazed with Bert, there was something about him that filled me with confidence and joy. I guess it must be his jovial character and also his size. Physics says that objects with a large mass tend to have a stronger gravitational tug. Maybe that must somehow work with people too, at least emotionally and spiritually.

“It was my wife,” Bert explained. “She just wanted to say she was praying for my safe trip. I told her you were here too.” He placed his cell phone on the seat between us.

I noticed there was a rubber band coiled tightly between the phone’s keypad and the screen.

“That’s quite a unique thing you have there, Bert.” I pointed to the rubber band.

“Oh, so you’ve noticed. I call that my broadband.”

I was quite edified to see that Bert was not only a cheerful person but also a simple one. He could readily afford a more advanced phone, but he settles for the more rudimentary models, which are getting rarer.

“Let me guess . . . that band gives traction and keeps the phone from sliding while you drive.”

“Well, yes . . . I guess so . . . but—”

“Then it must also help to remind you to be spiritually flexible.”

“Spiritually flexible, Father? How?”

“Oh, the need to always be ready to receive and respond to whatever God may communicate to you in life in the form of joys and trials.”

“Wow, thanks, Father. I never saw the band that way.” He smiled again and scratched his head.

“Then what does it remind you of?”

“Oh, Father, I don’t want to disappoint you. That rubber band simply keeps the cell phone intact. I dropped it a couple of months ago, and it falls apart without the rubber band.”

[GULP!] I was speechless.

“It’s okay, Father, I’m ready to always learn something new every day.”

* * *

The mist gradually cleared and the sun’s light illumined the entire predeparture area. I was about to say something and I realized that Bert was no longer there.

* * *

I composed this imaginative piece in memory of my good friend Bert who left for heaven last March 25, liturgically the feast of our Lady’s Annunciation. The entire composition is made up, except for the story about the cell wrapped with rubber band. His children showed it to me on the 24th when I visited to give him the anointing of the sick.

Looking back, I am amused to think that Bert is actually that flexible broadband, the simple and sturdy rubber band that holds his family and friends together. Up to now from heaven, he’s helping everyone to be happy, fit, and in working condition to text God.