never odd or even

Yes, just as he had told the Cripple, why should I care for others who are not members of my family, who have not done anything for me? I have this piece of land which I have cleared. My duty is not to this nameless mass you call Filipinas. No country can claim my time, my loyalty. And as for God—I served him well by doing my fellowmen no harm, but instead brought them health when they came to me with their bodies wracked in pain. And for all these, my father was punished, I was punished. I am not going to test fate again.

The Cripple had looked sadly at him, then spoke, the words taking shape like jewels shining, glittering, impinging into his consciousness how easily he had been seduced by self-preservation: “If there is no country as such or as you know and recognize, then in your mind you must give its boundaries. Do this because without this country you are nothing. This land where you stand, from which you draw your sustenance, is the Mother you deny. It’s to her where your thoughts will go even if you refuse to think so, for it is here where you were born, where your loved ones live, and where in all possibility you will all die. We will love her, protect her, all of us—Bisaya, Tagalog, Ilokano, so many islands, so many tribes—because if we act as one, we will be strong and so will she be. Alone, you will fall prey to every marauder that passes by. I am not asking that you love Filipinas. I am asking that you do what is right, what is duty…”