Petitionee

To the chagrin of my father, a staunch champion of the Great American Dream (and a petitionee of his Americanized sister who almost did get him and his family, including me, over to San Ramon in California if he didn't die in 1989 just weeks after our visas were issued), the experience balanced out my predisposition toward the Western ideals, in which, like many Filipinos, I was amply spoonfed, (maybe brainwashed) by Hollywood movies, the American Top 40, the New York Times Best Seller list, not to mention Spam, McDonald's, Ralph Lauren, and the diaspora that had so many relatives moving to California or New York, acquiring an American twang, and sending over boxes upon boxes of "stateside" goodies every now and then.

This was accompanied with another from his wife, who reiterated her mode of address and rehearsed her earlier suit in even more deferential terms: 'I formerly presumed a bold request to you which I feare hath not come to your hands.' (49) The assumption of failed delivery was an effective excuse both for the petitioner's recapitulation and the petitionee's recalcitrance.

Because prayers are requests, it implies that the petitioner believes that the petitionee (either a god or another man) is capable of granting beneficence.