Chapter 13: HOW TO DRAW WITH YOUR BUTT


With nothing better to do, Juan Tabagwang and I were walking again along the busy street where the bird shop, “Mga Ibon ni Adarna,” was located. We noticed from a distance that the talkative, foul-mouthed, cursing, and blasphemous parrot, Periko, was busy doing something. Out of curiousity we approached the bird. We were surprised to find out that it had a pencil tucked between its beak and was busy doing some unusual and interesting scratches on a pad of paper. For a time Periko ignored us. But when it noticed that we were intruding on what it was doing, it gave us a malevolent look and then the finger. We got the message and went away.

“Periko is a bird genius!” Juan remarked.

“With those scratches, Periko will go places,” I said in jest. Then I burst out laughing.

But Juan was dead serious. He looked at me and said, “And we’re going nowhere with what we are doing?”

“I thought your Super-Butt is doing great?” I inquired, a bit surprised.

“Nope!” Juan said. “And lately most of my super ideas were rejected, including the last one, The Super-Shit.”

“Same thing happened to me,” I said half-heartedly. “A guy I know advised me to use my left hand to draw, because they won’t hire me if I use my right hand.”

“What happened then?”

I did not answer Juan and instead gave him an impish smile. “Use your butt, Juan,” I said jokingly. “You’re a much better artist than me.”

A smile lingered on Juan’s face in reaction to what I said. After that I did not see him for almost three months. I was concerned that something may have happened to him. So I gave him a visit. Do you know what he had been doing all this time? He was literally drawing with a pencil taped to his butt when I found him.

“Juan, you’re an idiot!” I remarked, surprised. “That’s not what I meant when I said you should draw with your butt.”

“I know,” he said. “But this is the last of my butt drawings.”

While Juan was busy with his butt, I looked at all the drawings he did that were tacked onto the wall. “It’s similar to the scratches of Periko,” I said. “What’s the title for these butt artworks?”

“Super-Butt II,” Juan answered in laughter. “I want you to go with me when I present it to Ed A. D’tor, the editor and art director who rejected my Super-Shit.”

We went to this well known publisher and studio, and Juan bravely presented his buttworks to Ed.

“What is this?” Ed asked, his eyes wide and bulging in disbelief as he looked at the drawings. “It seems to be drawn by a butt!” Ed said in an insulting way.

“Absolutely!” Juan exclaimed as he looked down on Ed with an air of superiority. “You’re not worthy to behold my left or right foot drawing, more so with my left hand, and even more so with my right hand.”

“Get out of my office!” Ed angrily shouted. “And take your buttworks with you.”

“You can have it,” Juan remarked. “You deserve it. It’s for buttheads like you!”

“Get out!” thundered Ed.

“I’ve already been out for a long time now,” Juan countered.

We exited the building, still able to hear Ed’s shouting. But Juan was very happy. “Oh, I feel good,” he said. Then he laughed. “I feel like I’m as free as a butterfly, free from the tyranny of those editor and art director buttheads.”

“Yeah, you’re free, but jobless,” I said. “What now?”

“To Tomadors’ Tavern,” Juan said, excited. “Let’s celebrate my freedom and joblessness!”

“But we were ‘excommunicated’ by Maria, or Super Kapre,” I reminded Juan.

“Oh, she’ll forgive us once she sees us,” Juan said. “It has been a while and I have a feeling that she already misses us.”

Juan was right. Even before we entered Tomadors’ Tavern, Maria looked excited upon seeing us. I don’t know why. Probably she missed our foolishness. Anyway, Juan chose the center table of the tavern and we ordered 13 bottles of “agua de pataranta.” As the bottles were emptied by us one after another, the tavern was slowly filled with Juan’s laughter. I never saw him so happy in all the times we’ve been together. “Freedom,” in whatever form, is indeed “liberating.”

We were drunk when we left the tavern. Juan blew a kiss goodbye to Maria, who gave us a winsome smile in return. Along the way we passed by the bird shop, “Mga Ibon ni Adarna.” We noticed that people were lining up to get a signed print drawing of Periko, the parrot’s scratches.

“Look at that!” I exclaimed as I nudged Juan who was too drunk and could barely walk straight. “Periko is becoming a millionaire while we are becoming penniless.”

Probably out of envy, Juan curses Periko. The bird gave him the finger. I hurriedly pulled Juan out of the way because Periko’s fans gave us angry stares. Far away from the bird shop we noticed that the sun had already set. As usual, due to our drunkeness and also to somehow mitigate our misfortune, we belted with gusto the drunken song of “how to draw with your butt.”

“La la la, sing with us now all you buttheads of the world, la la la ....”

By the way, before you readers go to the next story, do you know what happened to Periko after it became famous and earned a lot of money? Lately, I heard that it was represented by a “liar,” the same guy who represented the monkey who won the art competition, because its master was only feeding it crackers and pocketing all the money. Periko, like Juan, wanted to be free from subservience to its master. The call for freedom is indeed also for the birds and monkeys, heh heh!