my co-worker approached me earlier as i was at my office desk to ask me on something about the banking details information form that our personnel department sent us to fill up.  i explained to him to make sure that the information is precisely correct like the names on the account and our conversation started out like this:

“you have to make sure that you put in your name and your wife’s if it is a joint account – like, it’ll be for example ‘francis and/or ofelia mendoza’.”

his face was in shock as i mentioned the woman’s name.

“how do you know ‘ofelia’?”  he said.

“i don’t, i just thought of a female name out of nowhere . . . why?”  i gave him a puzzled look.

“she was my girlfriend when i was working in a textile factory in taiwan, she’s from marinduque.”  he added.

“oh, really?!  what a concidence!”  i blurted out.  “well, where is she now?”

francis said: “she’s been dead for four years, and it’s no joke.”

i shivered as i heard that.  out of thousands of female names – how did i thought of her name?