Bits and sketches

That lingering sense of loss

2011-12-26T14:53:00.001+08:00

The sense of loss is everywhere.

I feel it everyday, from the moment I wake up. I start down the stairs expecting to hear Vixen's footsteps, to see her welcoming me. I do repairs and I look to where she used to sleep; I keep taking care not to disturb her, but she's no longer there. I do some hammering, expecting her to bark, or to run where I am and to look on. There is always that expectation of her being there--and always that painful realization she is not. I leave the dried urine outside alone; the sun and rain will eventually dry and wash the smell away.

For years, everything I did at home and away was with thought of my babies, of Boobie, Almond, and Vixen. These past four years everything revolved around Vixen. This overbearing emptiness continues. I keep looking for her, watching for her, listening for her, waiting for her, as if somehow she'll be there.

What do I do without my dearest baby?

The days have no meaning now.

Living without you

2011-12-22T01:51:00.005+08:00

My dearest Vixen,

More than a day has passed since you died, and this world has become unbearable without you. I wake up waiting to hear your footsteps, only to find silence. I look to where you used to sleep, knowing I will never see you there again. I come home knowing you will never be there again to welcome me. I hear the rain knowing you will never again shake upon its sound, terrified of thunder. All the cares and worries that concerned you, all gone now, save for the memory of what once was.

When Boobie died, I had you and Almond for comfort. When Almond died, I had you. Now that you're gone, I have nothing. How many times have I asked you, in the silence of our hearts, not to leave me? How many times have I asked the fates or whoever is in charge of the universe to let me go first? The time for your feeding comes: you are not there.

Of course my surviving you is better for you. Who else would take care of you? The thought makes the pain no less. There is this awareness of your absence everywhere at home, even outside.

You are gone, and I can hardly bear it.

I walked around early tonight, almost in a daze, but not quite. For the first time in more than four years, I had a drink. I had three--J&B, straight up. I drank to your life. I thanked you for all that you were and always will be to me. I drank to following you soon.

Vixen, September 1, 1998-December 20, 2011

2011-12-20T18:01:00.005+08:00

My Vixen is gone. My Babes, my Sen-sen, all those loving names I called her.

She was with me for more than thirteen years, literally from the moment she was born, the only female in Boobie and Almond's second litter. I had to put her to sleep today, December 20, 2011. A cancer was taking her body; there were lumps on her liver, her lungs, her ribs. She could hardly walk. All her life I took care to make her happy, protecting her always, making sure she would never suffer. I had to let her go before the pain became too great.

She had been sick since the end of October. I feared the end was coming, but I held back my tears and held on to hope till yesterday, when it became clear she had to go, for her sake.

I don't know how many times I've cried or how hard. What does it matter?

My baby, my Vixen, my Babes, my Sen-sen, my Vickisensen is gone.

There is an emptiness inside that is almost unbearable. It hasn't even been a day, but weeks seems to have passed. It takes forever for a simple hour to pass. Time moves so slowly. I have lived too long.

With Vixen's passing, an era ends. Boobie came to me in 1991, Almond in 1995, Vixen in 1998. Boobie died in 2005, Almond in 2007, Vixen in 2011. My babies are gone. For the first time since 1991, I am in a house without babies.

Goodbye, my Sen-sen, my lovely. Thank you for for all the years of joy and comfort that you gave me.

Time moves so slowly, and life is dark now. Yes, I have lived too long.

Death, cycles, and a new year

2008-12-30T23:17:00.001+08:00

At the approach of every new year I tend to think in terms of cycles, of good years and bad years, of transition years that led to great years, and naturally perhaps, of really bad years, mostly those characterized by death. And so it is this year, as I look back at the year about to end. It comes to me as neutral: long-nurtured dreams and hopes remained largely unrealized despite initial hopes that maybe, just maybe, this would be the year for me, but then again (thus far anyway), no major deaths occurred.

It is perhaps quite morbid to dwell on death on what ought to be a season of joy and rebirth, of hope in a new year, but having gone through what has seemed like a long season of death, I can perhaps be forgiven, if a little. Some deaths leave you very much diminished, and irreversibly changed.

And so as it had been in New Years’ past, my thoughts turn to life and death amid the smoke, the fireworks, and the noise. Amid expressions of hope, I think of cycles and seasons, as if anything would really change because a political or scientific institution says we have entered into a new cycle, a change in the year, a new revolution around the sun. But when exactly does the cycle start? Where exactly does an ellipse begin? Are we actually in a new cycle or somewhere in between? Amid all the hype, all the greetings, all the hopes, when the old year ends and the new one begins, the night that sees both will in fact be the same, the years separated by a second but sharing very much the same night, and with it my same self, diminished by the lives I have lost, in the new year as in the old.

And my thoughts, I expect, will turn to cycles.

I find myself hoping that at the end of what has been a rather neutral year, having brought no great success but then no great disappointments, neither some delirious ecstasy nor some debilitating sorrow, that in the law of cycles, if such even exists, this neutral year about to end will lead to a great one, however “great” may be defined. Maybe just a good one will do. Or maybe something neutral.

Life teaches us somehow to look at cycles, from good to bad and vice-versa. Or perhaps at seasons, one season leading to the next. How else should we hope, if we should hope at all, if not to hope that the good will come again? Somehow. Even in a long season of death, that there will be life again. Somehow. And amid the tears, there will be some joy, even if some space is reserved always for tears, for losses that never can be replaced, days and lives and warmth and smiles that can never be regained.

And so I expect to find myself this New Year’s Eve standing outside my home, as I had in years past, in good years and in bad; I expect to find myself watching the fireworks and taking in the noise and the strangely wonderful smell of fireworks, looking up at the sky perhaps like some romantic fool, and, like always, dwelling on cycles, remembering the lives that are no longer with me, whose absence has diminished me, and yet smiling somehow, somehow, for the lives that remain with me, making life bearable, at times even wonderful.

All in cycles, if we believe in such things. But really, what choice do we have but to believe, even if we don’t?

In memoriam, Garpy, December 29, 1982-August 10, 1991, Lovingly remembered on the anniversary of his death

2008-08-10T14:17:00.002+08:00

After all these years,
I still remember.
That last day, that last time.
You waited for me,
one last time.
Then you left.
You saw me through the dark times,
then said goodbye.

After all these years,
you remain in my heart.

In memoriam, Boobie, June 18, 1991-July 21, 2005, lovingly remembered and terribly missed on the anniversary of his death

2008-07-21T00:05:00.000+08:00

It was hard to believe:
holding you that last day,
the breath gone from you,
everything about you still.
I knew it was coming;
the decision was mine to make.
By my nod, you went quietly, painlessly finally.
After fourteen years, you were no longer of this world.
I held you for the last time, and wept the loss...
as I do still,
as I stop to remember,
always to remember,
the good years, the wonderful years when I had you,
consigned to memory now,
in a world so suddenly different,
so suddenly changed,
so suddenly cold.

Are we just cockroaches, Part 2

2008-07-03T21:03:00.001+08:00

Every once in a while, when I feel overwhelmed by everything, thinking of lives that I have lost and dreams that have died and things that will never be, I come to realize just how insignificant I actually am, how little and meaningless and insignificant my grief, my concerns, and my aspirations are in a world which has seen countless lives lost over billions of years.

From the thousands of deaths in the recent China earthquake to the hundreds who met their watery deaths at sea with the ill-fated Princess of the Stars, lives have come and gone with barely a whisper in the immeasurable expanse of time. Why should we then think of ourselves as so important, so special just because we can think and create and remember?

This sense of self-importance, a major feature of the Christian religion that proclaims man to have been made in the image of God, should bring honest men and women to ask: What, if anything at all, makes us so important?

Honest people, looking into themselves, at the history of the planet, and at the whole range of possibilities in the universe, should come to the same painful conclusion: NOTHING, NOTHING AT ALL. Nothing differentiates us from the pigs that become our (your) meat or the dead cockroach that we throw unceremoniously into the wastebasket. In the end, it seems, we are here simply to live out our days and die, just like every kind of life that we know of.

Which makes the the promise of an afterlife more appealling, perhaps even necessary if we are indeed to lead good lives.

But what if there is no afterlife? As asked before, why should we be entitled to an afterlife when we refuse to accord such a possibility to creatures that are more beautiful and innocent and kind than we are or could ever be?

Perhaps we deserve no afterlife.

But if there is no afterlife, what consolation is there? Are we just cockroaches that crawl, are stepped on, then die?

Think about it this way: either way, afterlife or not, death should be a boon. If, after this existence, we do meet the loved ones who had gone before us, then well and good. If, however, all is nothingness come death, maybe just as well. If we are indeed just cockroaches, then death should be a blessing. The very thought that it would all be over should be consolation enough. After all, with the peace of nothingness, who needs the burden of consciousness?

###

When life was complete

2008-06-29T03:43:00.006+08:00

This beautiful card was made by my daughter Cristine and was given to me on Father's Day, June 15, 2003.
More than just a Father's Day card, it is a picture of a life that was once complete: a family surrounded by cats and three wonderful dogs.
Life was good then.
Before my father-in-law died in July 2003.
Before my father died in 2004.
Before Boobie died in 2005.
Before the last of my cats died in 2005
Before Prudence died in 2006.
Before Almond died in 2007.
My daughter didn't know it then, and neither did I, but with her card she made the last depiction of my life when it was complete.
This card, old and and worn as it is, is precious.

They who love little

2008-06-27T18:09:00.009+08:00

An employee in the company I work for was buried today. I never knew her. She was on a mountain in Zambales province with her mountaineering friends, crossing a creek, when she was swept away by the rampaging waters brought about by typhoon Fensheng. That was Sunday, June 22. Her body was found some time Monday morning. Jhoanna, as her name was, was an only child. She was also single.

How bleak the world must be today for her parents. When you lose your only child, what have you left? Where lies your consolation in a world gone mad, a life suddenly turned upside down? Darkness comes more grimly somehow, the silence more oppressively. In times of grief, you survive by holding on to what you have left. But when it is an only child that you lose, finding that "something left" must be next to impossible.

I know the pain of loss. Even with the passage of time, it creeps up on you every now and again, making you pause to reflect on life as it has been ever since such loss--and wonder what is left. As you remember the good days, the days ahead seem even more daunting.

How we who grieve envy those who love little. They never will know the pain, the loss, the utter helplessness and hopelessness that we feel upon a loss. They may lose their loved ones, but they get by well. Their lives, after all, are focused on other things.

And they who love little are not as uncommon as it may seem. Rather, they are everywhere, focused on their careers, on accumulating wealth, on reaping honors, on making discoveries.

In a season of loss, such as I have known, it is easy to envy them--those people whose lives center on their careers, their work, their art, their science. For them, after all, what is there to lose that they cannot have again? Careers can be replaced, so can jobs, so can the outlet for artistic expression or scientific pursuit.

But how do you replace a life? A life lost is lost; there is no replacement. The world changes dramatically, and the change is irreversible.

Indeed, how bleak the world can be for those who have loved much and lost. How envious we become of those who love little. They can never really be hurt.

###

Are we just cockroaches, Part 1

2008-06-24T02:55:00.005+08:00

Anyone who has mourned the loss of a loved one knows that the single thought that offers the most comfort in times of bereavement, which gives us the strength to go on in the midst of almost unbearable and seemingly unending grief, is the possibility--more than that,the promise--of an afterlife, the continuation of our existence beyond the world as we know it, in a kind of existence we as yet cannot understand--one, however, that will allow us to be with our loved ones again, in a place with no more pain, no more tears, no more parting, no more death. Even atheists can--and perhaps do--believe in a greater consciousness that governs existence in its different planes, maybe not that god preached by Christianity and the other major religions, but a consciousness and intelligence way beyond our comprehension.

But what if there is no afterlife? Or god or that supreme intelligence governing the universe? What if god or that supreme intelligence, if it actually exists, sees us in the same way we see a cockroach, just a pest to be stepped on?

Put a different way, if we do not believe that the life we extinguish with hardly any thought--the cockroach, the mouse, the pig--continue to exist beyond their death in some way, perhaps as some higher existence, why should we believe that our own life, our own consciousness continues after we die?

It is the pinnacle of human arrogance and self-importance to claim an afterlife but at the same time dismiss its possibility for nonhuman life. After all, what makes us different from a cockroach?

In the play "Inherit the Wind," Drummon says, "Mr. Brady, why do you deny the one faculty of man [that] raises him above the other creatures of the earth: the power of his brain to reason? What other merit have we? The elephant is larger; the horse is swifter and stronger; the butterfly is far more beautiful; the mosquito is more prolific. Even the simple sponge is more durable. Or does a sponge think?"

The power to reason. Some would add the ability to empathize: the fact that, unlike most animals (chimpanzees, though, like humans, have been found to be capable of empathy), we can appreciate the fact that another living creature is experiencing pain. Others would add creativity. Perhaps imagination. But they all go back to Drummond's argument on thought, the power to reason, to remember, to create, the very power that makes us believe that we are higher than and separate from nonhuman life ("the one faculty of man [that] raises him above the other creatures of the earth")--the very thing that, unlike nonhuman life, gives us souls, we who have been made "in the image of God."

But think about it. What if there is something, some aspect of existence, that is far higher than the power to reason or to create or to remember? We cannot fathom it because we do not have the ability to do so. What if there is something beyond the power to reason that we, because of our small minds and limited perspectives, cannot even begin to comprehend?

What if, in the grand scheme of things, we were but cockroaches to a far greater intelligence, as much able to understand the language and thought of such intelligence as a cockroach is able to understand or appreciate the poetry of Yeats?

What if all the things we are so proud of, such as our thought and reason and creativity, are simply the crawling movements of a pesky cockroach to some greater intelligence that is capable of far, far more than we can even imagine?

Such greater intelligence would probably find it laughable, that we in our arrogance and unmitigated sense of self-importance would think ourselves worthy of the sympathy and appreciation of an intelligence responsible for the birth and death of planets and galaxies, or for the birth and death of countless lives for billions of years on our one planet alone. To such greater intelligence, it would be laughable for us to believe in an afterlife just as it would be laughable to many of us to think that cockroaches would actually believe in an afterlife for themselves, a place and time where every dead cockroach would gather in a paradise of their own--no more stepping feet or foul insecticides, just a free-roaming cockroach paradise.

Funny? So perhaps would our aspiration for an afterlife be to an intelligence that sees us in the same way we see cockroaches.

The thought itself can be distressing. If it were so, there would be no point to life. There would be no point to law or morality or ethics or decency. There would be no point to order, no point at all to kindness or mercy, no point even to beauty. After all, it all goes to naught. No reunions after this life, no paradise, no meeting of lovers and loved ones after death.

Ashes to ashes, nothing more. Like a dead cockroach being thrown into a waste basket and eventually being eaten up by ants.

When we pray to "God" or to that higher consciousness, why doesn't "God" or that higher consciousness answer? "Do you not hear me?" Pharoah asks in "The Ten Commandments." Indeed, does "God" not hear? Then again, do we hear the cockroach? Is there perhaps a cry for help every time we move to step on a cockroach?

This thought, however, distressing as it may be, should also be humbling. Shorn of the human arrogance promoted by the world's major religions, which places human beings at the pinnacle of existence, the thought of ourselves as some greater intelligence's cockroach might help us find the humility to co-exist with other inhabitants of this planet, to treat their lives and death with respect, knowing all to well that there is no difference between the death of a cockroach and the death of a human being, both instances being the end of life for something that had once been alive, and in the end being of no consequence to the higher beings with greater power and intelligence in a universe and existence we know very, very little of.

Are we made in the image of God, or are we just cockroaches to a higher intelligence?

Put a different way: If you were God, would you reflect yourself as a cockroach?

###

In memoriam, Boobie, June 18, 1991-July 21, 2005, lovingly remembered and terribly missed on the anniversary of his birth

2008-06-18T02:34:00.008+08:00

My dearest,
You nibbled on my button
and healed a broken heart.
You looked at me from behind her legs,
and I fell in love with you.
You were home.
I loved you every day you were with me.
You are gone now but always remembered.
And the love,
it remains.

Weary, getting wearier

2008-06-09T15:37:00.003+08:00

I felt terribly tired last night. It was not the first time I felt that way. It was perhaps the same kind of weariness the old folks feel, having lived their lives, whether they achieved their dreams or not, whether they still have something more to give or not. It is that painful longing for rest. It felt it last night, perhaps more heavily than usual.

It's been more than a year now since Almond died, and the days have been so excruciatingly long. I get surprised sometimes to learn that things I thought had occurred years ago actually occurred just about a year ago, perhaps even earlier than that. The year that has passed since Almond's death seems like years, a lifetime, even several lifetimes. The days leave me weary.

Sleep comes as a comfort. Waking up brings distress.

In memoriam, Almond Dec. 16, 1994-June 2, 2007, Lovingly remembered on the first anniversary of her death

2008-06-02T00:36:00.008+08:00

"And death shall have no dominion.
Dead men naked they shall be one
With the man in the wind and the west moon;
When their bones are picked clean and the clean bones gone,
They shall have stars at elbow and foot;
Though they go mad they shall be sane,
Though they sink through the sea they shall rise again;
Though lovers be lost love shall not;
And death shall have no dominion."
- Dylan Thomas

Someday, I shall hold you once more;
Impatiently, I wait.

Prudence, April 2, 1999-January 13, 2006. Lovingly remembered on the anniversary of her birth.

2008-04-02T10:11:00.011+08:00

You brought so much joy to us.
How changed the world has been without you.

What's love got to do with it?

2008-03-03T06:07:00.003+08:00

It ought to be about dogs. About friends, that is, not trophies; companions, not inventory. Purebreeds are great, but askals should be welcome as well. Askals are canines, too.

Having worked briefly for the Philippine Canine Club, Inc., a non-profit corporation involved in the promotion of dog breeding in the Philippines, I came to see up close how the ownership of the "best" dogs around (note the quotation marks) does not necessarily translate into love for dogs. Where dog breeders are concerned, it's simply not a given. For many dog breeders, the professional ones at least, it's not about friendship or companionship. It's about the sport, the prestige, the prize. For that's what they and their ilk consider dogs to be: the subject of sport, even though the most common type of dog show in the Philippines, the so-called conformation show, is more beauty contest than it is sport.

I really shouldn't have been surprised or even disappointed. After all, I had seen it years ago when my babies, despite all I did to prevent it, still produced puppies. I could easily spot dog breeders when they came. How? They never smiled at the sight of puppies at play. The others did, those who came looking for a pet, often one to replace a pet they had lost. The dog breeders were different. They examined the pups like they would possible inventory, looking for patches of thin hair, the like. It often made you wonder if they could pass through the same kind of scrutiny themselves. Anyway, dogs are a lot smarter than these professional dog breeders think. One pup, Beloved, just lay down listlessly when a family of dog breeders came; when a mother came later looking for a dog for her child, Beloved was up and playing, showing her best.

Dogs know. And dog breeders, out to control, just don't give dogs that much credit.

For them, it's about the sport, the prestige, the prize. And perhaps the money that comes with all that.

Being around these dog breeders, though, you often wonder exactly what's in it for them. Many really don't love dogs. They don't talk about dogs that creatures that they love but as objects for competition. Outside of competition and breeding champion lines, the dogs are nothing. They spend much, yes, but for the monetary or prestige objective, not for the actual care of such wonderful creatures. But do they really get much money out of breeding? Maybe, maybe not. With all the money they put in for the best food, who knows if they actually make money? Who can afford their dogs? What's in it for them anyway? You got me.

I have a theory, though. For the most part, I've found professional dog breeders to be mediocre people who, outside of their money, much of which has come out of accident of birth, they don't have much by way of accomplishment to speak of. They have a bloated sense of self-importance, such that they expect to be attended to lavishly every time they come around. So they breed dogs. It's easy. The dogs are beautiful to begin with. You just have to make sure you don't spoil that beauty--which dog breeders often do, however, by turning dogs into robots.

For them, what's love got to do with it?

In memoriam, Prudence April 2, 1999-January 13, 2006, on the anniversary of her death.

2008-01-13T06:00:00.000+08:00

You were our jewel.
Now so terribly missed.

A cat's tale

2008-01-07T13:20:00.000+08:00

(Published in Prime Weekly under the column “Still Life,” June 15, 1989)

It came about suddenly, the realization. One night I noticed how the cats were all around, as if in a world within a world. I saw the compact shapes by street corners and garbage piles, perhaps figures at a distance revealed only by the faint light of street lamps. It was a world that came alive at night, a world where I was a stranger, an intruder. The cats seemed to be everywhere, just lurking in the darkness, and their presence almost seemed to carry purpose. What that was, however, or if there was really anything of the sort, I couldn’t say. But they were there, stray cats, survivors in a world of no compassion. The night ushered in their world, and that world became clearer and clearer with time. I would see them watching, and at times I would see their eyes. Those eyes were almost frightening. But then they were only cats, strays, and the cats had always been around, neglected, fending for themselves, surviving somehow.

At night I saw them, and I entered their world. Sometimes I would sense some purpose to their presence, some logic and reason in their movement. At times I felt there was something going on, something that the cats reserved only for themselves. Perhaps, I thought, the night held certain secrets. What it was the cats did, if anything at all.

One night while I was on my way home I noticed something different about the cats. I noticed, what, a purpose in their movement, direction. I saw one cat emerging from the darkness. I didn’t give the matter very much notice till I saw others doing the same thing. The occurrence struck me as strange; I thought perhaps that it was just coincidence, some matter that merited nothing more than a moment’s thought, but as I walked on I noticed a certain oneness in the way they moved, in how other cats joined what could have been a solemn march, in how they all seemed to be taking to the streets, as if by some silent understanding. That night, overcome by curiosity, I followed them.

Cautiously I did, taking care not to cause any disruption. The cats moved slowly, even then with purpose and direction, and as I followed them I knew there was a reason for what they were doing. Somehow I knew. Quietly the cats seemed to be headed somewhere. I moved with them and watched them. Several times some of them stopped and seemed to look at me, but then they always continued on their way. To where, however, I still didn’t know.

For the moment my world was reduced to the cats. Only the world of the cats existed, and I was an outsider, an observer. I was there, it seemed, only by their silent consent. I followed them, wondering where they were headed, till finally they stopped. And I realized that there were other cats around, some with their bodies barely visible in the darkness. They had gathered by a dark portion of one street, and I seemed to be the only person around, as though I had been chosen to witness whatever was to occur, if anything. It was quiet by that portion of the street, and the cats were no longer moving. They were simply waiting, so it appeared. They stayed by the sides of the road as vehicles passed by now and again. Then I saw one more feline coming.

By the light of a distant street lamp I caught sight of the approaching figure, just one cat moving slowly, wearily, even then with a feline grace. The other cats kept still and waited. The cat continued on its slow approach. The other cats looked on, rather solemnly. I remained where I was, keeping still and just observing what was happening. What it all meant, I still didn’t know. Just the cats waiting for this one cat on a quiet road. The strays, the homeless, the unloved.

Then I saw the light. It got brighter and brighter, all so quickly. A car was coming. The cat continued in the same direction toward the others, still slowly. The car was moving faster now, yes, the bright headlights beamed. The cat was in its path, and the vehicle wasn’t slowing down. The other cats did nothing. They just looked on silently. The vehicle sped closer to the moving cat, the newcomer. I wished to call out, perhaps for the driver to put on the brakes, but I never got to do so.

There just came the sound, that horrible sound. Like something bursting.

The vehicle was quickly gone. The other cats were still silent.

Another vehicle was coming. A third. That sound again, that sound.

The other cats just looked on. Witnesses, I thought.

For some time there was an uneasy silence. One cat gone, a stray, run over three times in a world of no compassion. After a long silence the cats began to wail, as if in grief. Almost in an anguished chorus, the stray cats wailed, as if the mourn the loss of one of them, just a stray, a survivor till that night. And as the cats wailed, I listened, even then chilled by the sound.

Till the cats turned silent and began to leave, some of them walking away slowly, others just running and disappearing into the camouflage of darkness. I remained where I was and just looked on as the cats disappeared. One cat stayed close by, hardly more than a kitten. It seemed to look at me, to watch me for a few seconds, then it walked away, alone, a young survivor in a hard and heartless world.

###

All the reasons why I hated and will always hate 2007

2007-12-31T18:27:00.000+08:00

In a matter of hours, the year 2007 will come to a close. It's been a hard year, a bad year, a cruel year. So here are the reasons why I hated and will always hate 2007.

1. I lost my dearest Almond. With her gone, a light within me was extinguished, at least in this existence. Things will never be the same. Or really good again. Then again, all that started in 2005, with the loss of Boobie.

2. I was unproductive. I produced nothing of real value this year.

3. I was hospitalized for eight days. It put a drain on just about everyone's resources.

4. I had no new clients.

5. I barely earned. It's a miracle (or a curse?) that I even survived this year.

6. I quit drinking. Without the oblivion of hard drink, the pain has become so much worse.

So here's to this awful year ending. The problems kept coming; even now as the year's about to end, they still do.

2007, I flush you down the septic tank. You were unusually cruel.

In memoriam, Garpy Dec. 29, 1982-August 10, 1991, on the anniversary of his birth

2007-12-29T09:26:00.000+08:00

"Farewell, dear darling of my soul. A parting blessing on my love. We shall meet again, where the weary are at rest."
- Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities

The gift-giver (A Christmas story of a different sort)

2007-12-21T08:53:00.000+08:00

(This was published in the December 7, 1989 issue of Prime Weekly under the column "Still Life." It's being republished here as a Christmas thought.--Jose Luis Tolentino)

He came only once a year, but every year he came, appearing in the run-down neighborhood of the city and bringing gifts to the occupants of a small apartment, a mother and her two sons. He was somewhere in his forties, distinguished in appearance and unmistakably wealthy. Exactly who he was, what he was to the family and why he brought them gifts, no one could say. The family volunteered no information. Every year, however, come December, he would bring gifts of ham and cheese and fruit, clothes, toys for the children whose eyes lit up every time he came. He would arrive on an evening close to Christmas Even, and in the small apartment they would celebrate the season. There would be good cheer and joyful times. Only once year, but he always came.

Of the family there was nothing special, nothing that made them any different than their neighbors. They were among the poor folk who often had to do without, the poor folk who watched with envy as the wealthy lived their easy and luxurious lives. Of course, just like her neighbors, the mother had led a hard life, a sad life. She had married when she was seventeen, and hers had been a stormy marriage, an unhappy one. Still she endured that marriage and focused her attention on the children. Then her husband passed away, meeting his end in a drunken brawl. Since then she had taken care of the children on her own.

Then the gift-giver came. He first appeared one afternoon and stayed for hours. The next time he was seen was in December, and every December after that.

In the neighborhood there was much curiosity about the gift-giver, about how he came to know the family. And in the neighborhood, perhaps, there was envy. When the gift-giver came the family of three would have a feast. Hard times or not, they would celebrate. The mother would smile--it was so seldom that she smiled--and the children's laughter would be hearty. They would have their fill of food, rich food--the feast of the wealthy, with still so much left over for the next few days. And in the small apartment the gift-giver would sing. The neighbors would hear his rendition of familiar songs and Christmas carols. Later on, with the gift-giver having already left, they would ask the mother about him.

"He is a friend," she would say, always.

"Could they be lovers?" it was asked.

Neither the mother nor the children would say. Anyway the mother was happy when he came, so were the children. Come December they would expect him, and always he would come. As he did just two days before Christmas.

It had been a particularly hard and trying year for the family of three, and the gifts he brought them were especially welcome. And like always, in a neighborhood where only the poor folks lived, the gift-giver and the family of three had the feast of kings. And the neighbors talked. They thought of the good food that the gift-giver brought. It had been a hard year for them, too, a bad year. How they envied the family of three, how they resented the mother and her two sons.

From their homes they listened as laughter sounded from the small apartment where the family of three lived. They listened to the gift-giver as he sang Christmas carols. Everything else seemed to have stilled as attention went to the small apartment, to thoughts of the kind of feast inside. It had been a bad year for all of them, yet...

"There, they dine like kings!"

The men smoked their cigarettes, shook their heads in disgust, spat on the ground. The women grunted. The resentment grew as the evening wore on.

"Are they any better?" it was asked.

It was nurtured, the envy and resentment.

Then finally, the gift-giver emerged from the small apartment. He was leaving. He said goodbye to the family of three--till next year, yes--then he started walking. For a few seconds all the neighbors did was watch him.

And us? And us?

Children went to him with their hands held out for anything that he could give. They, too, longed for good food, ham and cheese and fruit. Women went to him. It was Christmas time, but they had little for the family, for the children. The gift-giver continued walking, however slowly now as people stood in his way, as they tried to get something, anything from him. And the men went to him now. The good food and the cold beer, some scotch, perhaps some imported brandy. Could they have none of these?

The gift-giver seemed distressed, helpless. Still silent, he tried to walk on, but it became more and more difficult as the residents of the area fell upon him, asking, asking, asking. The gift-giver could only look at them, he had nothing to give. Still they surrounded him and kept him from going any farther. More and more of them came--children, men, women...

Asking...

Help us, they said. Give us a feast, a real feast. If just for tonight, one night. And sing your Christmas carols.

But the gift-giver's eyes contained only apology.

###

In memoriam, Almond Dec. 16, 1994-June 2, 2007, on the anniversary of her birth

2007-12-16T15:17:00.000+08:00

One of my brightest lights is gone.
My world is darker now.

Ashes to ashes

2007-12-14T06:45:00.000+08:00

Even the greatest of memorials fade in significance. For the ordinary folk such as myself, memorials turn to dust. We make memorials of all sorts in our desire to preserve a memory, to have our loved ones remembered, not just by ourselves but more especially perhaps by others. In the end, however, once those who had known the departed becomes themselves departed, the memorials turn to dust.

Last month, as million trooped to the nation’s cemeteries for the All-Saints Day holidays, I visited the grave of my old boss, my former editor-in-chief. Amid the throngs of people at the cemetery, the mausoleum where his remains lie was quiet, nestled in a peaceful place with other similarly quiet mausoleums. There were a few flowers, but there was no one there. The mausoleum itself was beautiful and appropriately serene, but there was no one there. Many of his generation are long gone. His works and writings live on, but soon enough they will be just words to a name. Years from now, there will be no one to remember the kind of person that he was.

My father’s ashes lie in an urn placed upon an altar in my mother’s bedroom. My father was both a doctor and a lawyer, and he achieved much while he was alive. He was well-liked and well-respected, a giant among Filipino pathologists. He has no grave to speak of, no memorial which people outside the family can visit—just his ashes in an urn, on an altar in my mother’s bedroom. It’s a quiet and private memorial, but a memorial just the same, with photographs around to remind us of him. His name will surely live on, but when we who had known him and loved him are gone, his ashes will become truly dust. Our memorials to him will fade.

My own beloved babies, enshrined in memory in this blog, were buried in the ground. No casket for them, so they literally returned to the earth whence they came. I make all the memorials to them, for them, but none of those memorials can ever capture the everyday joy I felt when they were alive, the comfort they gave me during the dark times, the love they offered unconditionally, the very beauty they possessed. I can perhaps save part of the ground they’re buried in should, for some reason or another, at some time or another, that ground may become inaccessible to me. But when my gone, even that hallowed dirt will become simply dirt.

Ashes to ashes. Dust thou art, to dust thou shall return.

“He’s not really dead, you know. Not as long as we remember him.”

Insightful words from Dr. McCoy to Capt. Kirk in “Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan” after they had given Spock a burial in space.

Indeed, as long as we remember them.

But for our departed to live on in memory, we who had loved them would have to live forever. To remember them, yes, to tell others about them, to keep their images from fading, to preserve their memory in family lore. But we, too, shall become ashes. We, too, shall become dust. And when we do, their memorials will lose all significance.

Our memorials matter only while we live. Strange, but we make these memorials precisely because we want others to remember our departed loved ones even when we’re gone. For ourselves, we need no memorials. After all, we hold them in our hearts. While we live, they remain in our hearts, alive and well somehow, with us still. They come to us in our thoughts, in the grief that never really goes away, in the tears we shed in the quiet of night. We need no memorials in stone or marble. We are their memorials. But we inevitably become dust. The real memorials become dust.

It may be disheartening to think that our loved ones will finally be truly dead, finally unremembered, when we who had loved them, who remember them, are dead as well. But even in such a disheartening thought, we may find some consolation. After all, who wants to live forever remembering a loved one, when one can join that loved one in whatever existence follows this life?

Give me a reunion in ashes anytime and let my memorials fade.

###

So what for silent nights

2007-12-13T06:40:00.000+08:00

A Christmas Offering

(I wrote this piece in 1982 when I was still a student at the College of Business Administration of the University of the Philippines in Diliman. It appeared on the front page of the December 1982 issue of the Guilder Newsletter. I no longer really "celebrate" Christmas, but I'm putting it here as an offering this Christmas season to whoever may be reading. - Jose Luis Tolentino)

We can just imagine how it must have been at the start, when such a real silent night took place, when all the lights we know of now took the form of a single bright light leading the magi to the Child.

Christmas nights, as we know them now, are anything but silent. Even when the songs and laughter of expectant children take respite, the lingering traces of their tones escort a mind of sleep. Christmas lights burn and chant till dawn, and for consecutive nights, a choir of churches manages well to sing. Young people dream of dates; some worry over funds. While the rest of the family sleep, a child wishes for those presents lying by a tall and jolly tree, each night for him setting with the toll of a kind, imaginary bell bringing time closer to the day. A lonely man as these occur, watches from his window—ponders; for a while, he smiles.

Christmas nights are never silent. Often, the faces of the people speak; worries and disappointments come out, hope and anticipation accompany the smiles of others. Around campus, the mood is strong. The cloudy Christmas sky, almost distinct to the season, hails an oft-claimed joy, proclaims the much-said goodwill to man. Gifts are passed, nights are planned. Expectancy of better things relieves the solitary man, and almost everything is carried out with a Christmas theme.

We never think of Christmas nights as silent, yet the song remains perhaps the most popular and durable of the season. Christmas nights, in fact, come as the busiest in the year for most of us; we greet friends we hardly know, relatives who, for the most part of the year, remain as strangers. We do feel it, don’t we? It is a mood that we ourselves bring toward the end of a year; for some, it becomes a reflective, depressing season, and yet we want it; it is tradition; Christmas has been with us since childhood.

Christmas nights were perhaps better when we were kids, and for some of us, the dread of actually encountering a real “silent night” during a future season, is not so distant. It would be fortunate if all of us were to spend the rest of our days experiencing Christmas nights filled with the joy and the air of brotherhood.

Yet we need not worry about silent nights in Christmas. Even in the worst of times, Christmas comes, and it comes with its sounds, its lights, though less intense, but always, the voice of Christmas reaches us and sings.

Christmas nights are anything but silent. It is only when the last light of Christmas passes out, when the final traces of a Christmas song are sung, that the silent nights suddenly arrive.

###

The madman comes

2007-12-10T03:54:00.000+08:00

Published in Prime Weekly under the column “Still Life,” April 27, 1989

He wasn’t anything at all like Nietzsche’s madman who rushed to the marketplace in the bright morning hours and proclaimed the death of God. Neither was he anything like those who roamed the city in tattered clothes, unwashed and apparently deranged. Rather, he seemed quite conventional. He had, I felt, the appearance of a fairly wealthy man, the air of a politician, the eyes of a philosopher. How could anyone, I asked, mistake him for a madman? That he was, however, so they insisted. The madman comes, they said, he comes. Even then they listened. From him, perhaps, they sought amusement.

At the park on a Sunday afternoon I saw this man, this madman. It was the first time I had ever seen him. At the park he attracted the attention of passers-by. There, by a small, curious crowd, he spoke.

“You call me mad,” he said, his eyes carrying an almost impressive fire. “But is my madness just the perception of your madness?”

He sighed with a weary breath, then he continued.

“My folks were mad,” he said. “I was their only child, and I was brilliant, the kind of child they had always dreamed of having. I topped my class, and they were proud of me for that. They showed me off, see our child, our brilliant child. I studied, read, memorized, learned. I grew wise, but my folks grew mad, day by day falling into lunacy. I saw reasons where they saw lunacy, order where they saw chaos, madness where they saw convention. As I grew wiser, they grew madder.

“Even as a child I was the only one who could see, the only one who could hear. I was educated by priests, and from them I learned science and mathematics, literature, the arts. I learned about faith and prayer, and I learned discipline. I guess they were good men, but I soon realized that they were mad. In their faith I saw contradictions. I entered the university when I was old enough and wise enough, and I stood in awe at the brilliance of worldly men with worldly notions, philosophers and statesmen, intellectuals, scientists. But they, too, were mad. Their principles were contradictions. I was educated by madmen, and when all that was over I worked with them, for them. I took their money and the recognition that they gave me. In madness I immersed myself.

“I rubbed elbows with men and women who sold their souls for comfort and prestige, artists of all kind who destroyed their lives for the chance to live forever. I mixed with intellectuals and scientists who enslaved themselves with the kind of work and ideas that would free humanity. Arts and sciences held my world. Philosophy held my thoughts, commerce held my life. I gave my time and my sweat, my toil. My very life was up for sale, and it was bought by madmen in a mad world. My very life was owned by them. We planned and dreamed, we toiled, we conspired. These were worldly men. I basked and delighted in their madness. Elsewhere were spiritual men. I took their faith and their philosophies and the rituals that would set them free, yet enslaved them.

“I then realized I had had enough. I was the only sane person among them.”

The madman stopped to catch his breath. No one was speaking now, no one was laughing. During the silence I kept my attention on this man, this paradox of brilliance and madness, insight and inanity.

“I just came from a gathering of wise men,” he continued. “Such wise men, I thought, such proud men who spoke before a crowd of simple folks. They didn’t just talk, no, they discoursed. I stood there with the simple folk and listened to these philosophers and intellectuals, the great thinkers of our time who sought their own place in eternity, their own contribution to the wealth of humanity’s ideas. They spoke of life and immortality, the nature of the universe, the destiny of humanity. They discussed the very meaning of life, these wise men. They debated politics, democracy and tyranny, the individual and the state, the endless isms that held us spellbound. Such wise men.

“They waxed with eloquence and brilliance, these proud men. Who could stand before them? Who among the simple folk could match them? They spoke of the hereafter, of the law and morality, of rebellion and the social contract, the social conscience, metaphysics, ideology, theology. One against the other, the arguments and insights of educated, brilliant men. They discussed the reasons for existence. They asked the timeless questions of humanity, and their audience listened in awe. The hungry, the sick, the homeless and the unemployed, how they all listened. Madmen making madmen of us all. I didn’t stay to see the end of it, I couldn’t.

“So I came here, seeking sanity. Tell me now, have I found it? Right here, right now, is there sanity?”

He turned silent and just observed the people who passed by and those who had gathered by him. He seemed tired, as if his talk had drained him of strength. Wearily, it seemed, he looked at each one of us as though he had the power to look into our souls. In our lives, perhaps, in our souls, he saw madness. He signed and looked down.

“I saw a child,” he said. “A beautiful child. How I felt for him, pitied him. The hope and the future of humanity, taught by madmen in a mad world.”

He said nothing more. The tears just started flowing from his weary eyes, and silently, we watched a madman weep.

###

Mock the Executioner

2007-12-07T05:48:00.000+08:00

Published in Prime Weekly under the column "Still Life," June 8, 1989

In a time of executioners, the executioner was faceless, nameless. He was the dispenser of justice in an intolerant society, the very sight of him and the mask that hid his face striking dread into the hearts of people. Only a few knew who he actually was. In this time of executioners, the executioner had taken many lives, some of which he felt were innocent. But then it was not for him to question or to argue or to judge, just to carry out the gruesome sentence. He had not the benefit of doubt that was thrown into modern executions. This was a time of executioners, and he was the executioner.

"It is my job," he often told himself. "It is what I do."

It was a secret that he shared with just a few others, a burden that he carried on his own.

When he had the time to spare and when the day was pleasant, the executioner took leisurely strolls just to pass the time away, to relax and to get his mind off the faces of people he had killed, the terrified looks of the condemned. He took those walks to mix with the ordinary folk, as though he were one of them.

One day while he was on a leisurely stroll, he came across a group of distinguished men and women, intellectuals, scientists and philosophers, statesmen, people from the university. There, at the square, as they carried on a lively discussion, the executioner stopped to listen. Some of the faces in the group were familiar. They were famous people, and their mere presence was enough to draw an audience. At the moment the discussion was being dominated by one man. A philosopher, another one of those famous and familiar faces.

He was rather elderly. He was thin and seemingly frail, but his very presence was impressive, carrying inner strength and conviction. The executioner knew this man; he had listened to this philosopher several times, and the executioner admired him, this wise and courageous man. That day, however, the executioner feared for him.

With impressive eloquence, the philosopher spoke of society, of its leaders and its institutions, of the government and the laws that were supposed to hold it together. He spoke of the moral decay and the crumbling conscience of the people and their leaders, and as he spoke of such things, his words carrying the force of his convictions and the outrage that he felt, the others listened. Now and then they nodded in agreement. Here was a wise man, a brave man, a true philosopher. The executioner looked on silently and listened. Here, he thought, was what the authorities would call a dangerous man.

Still he listened to this man as he went on, attacking the authority that held the land, the principles behind the laws, the institutions that yielded to corruption and decay. He attacked the very leaders of society; he denounced the greed and the corruption with such force that the others stood in awe of him. He spoke of change and revolution, of social upheaval. His words carried dire implications, but he seemed unafraid. His audience listened with awe, as did the executioner. But the executioner was well aware of the danger the philosopher was in. Sedition, they would say, rebellion, treason. Many times the executioner had seen it, and he feared for the philosopher. Still he kept silent. Perhaps the philosopher knew what he was doing.

The man himself showed no fear, and for some time his views went unchallenged. Then came those who questioned his assertions; finally they came forward to have their say, and a spirited debate ensued. Arguments were exchanged, and the philosopher defended his beliefs with the kind of eloquence and spirit that sometimes left his opponents speechless. He called for change, a real societal transformation, if by fire a purification of a society gone corrupt and decadent. He called for a tumbling of the pillars, a change in the institutions that had gone astray.

In the crowd there were those who nodded in agreement. Among the distinguished men and women there were those who agreed. From the philosopher's opponents came a tense, momentary silence. They stood there, faces flushed, their eyes filled with anger. The philosopher stood unwavering. Finally an official stepped forward.

"Men have died for less," he said.

And he warned the philosopher, stop this now. This was dangerous business.

The philosopher smiled. He grinned with sarcasm and eyed the official with disdain. He would stand by everything he had said, by his call for revolution and upheaval, for social transformation, however harsh. A purification, a cleansing of society. Once more the official warned him. Such treason, he said. The philosopher scoffed. Menacingly, the official pointed a finger at him.

"You shall meet the executioner," he said. "He shall have your head."

His voice said he meant it. Everyone was silent as he turned and walked away.

The silence continued as all attention fell upon the philosopher. After a while he smiled and looked at the distinguished faces in his audience.

"When that day comes," he said, "I shall spit at the executioner."

Again there was silence. And the executioner saw the man looking at him, as though the philosopher knew who he was. And as the scenes played in his mind, as he saw the philosopher coming before him on that fateful hour, the executioner stood there silently with the others, as though he were one of the ordinary folk, as though he were one of them.

###

TAKE MY FATHER…PLEASE!

2007-08-30T19:26:00.000+08:00

Published in Miscellaneous Weekly, June 10, 1991. Slightly revised, August 2007.

In memory of my father, Arturo D. Tolentino, Jr.

March 15, 1932-October 10, 2004

He was still with us when I wrote this.

AS A BOY I was into the habit of comparing fathers.

It must have started during my early years in school, lasting up to my late teens or early twenties. From elementary school essays and grossly exaggerated schoolyard boasts, it led to the more critical comparisons of adolescence, a time when the hand of authority was somehow firmer, yet the basis of authority somehow flimsier, with the man himself dislodged from his pedestal in the eyes of a once adoring son.

In many instances it was discovering what he was not. From being the very symbol of authority, the last word, the person who was always, always right, he became the man who understood little, the magnitude of his seeming mistakes and inadequacies only underscored by his stature during earlier days.

“Why isn’t Daddy tall?” I asked my mother once, many years ago.

I was then bothered by my height. I just wasn’t as tall as I wished to be.”He just isn’t. No one in his family is.”

“Why didn’t you marry someone tall?” I then asked.

At that point my mother simply laughed.

Daddy simply isn’t.

That was something I learned when I was still very young, a realization that would time and again be reinforced in the years that followed—the fact that there were many things that my father never was and would probably never be.

The pattern is familiar, a story repeated across cultures from one generation to another. At first he was everything—father, protector, teacher, provider. Whatever he was, he was what his son wished to be—doctor, lawyer, engineer, architect, soldier. The years, however, erode the myth of infallibility, and the man becomes all too human. The comparisons, perhaps, come unavoidably.

Consciously or otherwise, the habit of comparing fathers was something most of us indulged in then, just as others probably do today. It was perhaps at its strongest during high school and college years when the thirst for independence and freedom brought either the hand of authority or the wave of tolerance upon a restless youth. In many instances, “Honor thy father” gave way to “Fear they father.” Disillusioned hearts sought greener pastures. Sons sought better fathers.

Fathers varied from one family to another, and from son to son. Some helped their sons with school projects; others played ball games or went camping, hiking, even hunting;
Some were always around somehow, spending time with their families; some gave their sons advice, taught them how to drive or ride a motorcycle, how to pick coconuts out of a tall tree, how to fight. The comparisons, at times, brought envy.

One day, however, way back in high school, I was jolted by the sight of a friend in tears. With his face all red as he sat by the staircase, we wept like a baby before everyone—for the failing marks he received, for fear of what his father, in his rage, might do.

Stunned by the sight, I could just look on, never really having known that kind of fear.

That day, perhaps, I should have simply been glad for all those things my father never was, things by father never did.

IT SEEMS SO MUCH SIMPLER with the girls, as fathers seem more protective aqnd yet more tolerant with their daughters than with their sons.

From friend to disciplinarian, a father’s role with his son isn’t always very clear. At times the problem lies in knowing where one role ends and another begins. The strange relationship between father and son almost seems to hover between unity and distance, swinging from one emotion to another, from pride to disappointment, and evolving from one stage to another amid the complexities that stretch the ties between the “men” of the family.

Different intentions and emotions make the relationship pass through certain difficulties, and the competition surfaces sometimes. Both father and son play a game of catch-up, with the son catching up to the measure of his father, the father catching up with what he believes his son believes him to be. In certain cases, it’s the father catching up with old dreams, old ambitions, his own quest for immortality through his son.

“It’s all in them now,” one father said to another in a conversation about their children.

Their dreams in their children now, yes, in their sons.

A few years back, a distant relative I had not seen for quite some time remarked on how much I resembled my father. It was like seeing a younger version of the man, a carbon copy.

Similar remarks are often passed in casual conversations on fathers and sons. Somewhere, a proud father points our how his grandson not only looks like his son, but has the same temperament, the same stubbornness and immovable poker face.

“Now you know what it’s like,” he tells his son.

From one carbon copy to another.

One father I knew had mostly sons for his children, seven or eight of them. Silent and unsociable, with sharp eyes and a stiff jaw, he was a man who seldom smiled. His own sons seemed very much the same, just younger versions of their father.

It would appear that some fathers wish their sons to be better imitations of themselves. It’s the burden of the son to make the cut, the frustration of the father t see his son going a different way.

Disagreement bares the competition, the power struggle that at times exists between the two. It eventually comes to a point where father no longer knows what’s best.

A friend during my college days once spoke derisively of his father. Recounting how the man had offered some advice on relationships with women, the apparently disillusioned son scoffed.

“Don’t I already know those things?”

Fatherly advice that perhaps came too late.

Disillusioned sons and rebels are not all that uncommon, and at times the differences between father and son explode in the political arena, with conflicting sides pitting son against father, the liberal against the conservative.

The son finds his own direction. Spitting out the admonitions of the father, he goes ahead with his desires in pursuit of happiness and freedom, of his ideas and ideals. He questions the assumed wisdom of the generations, and he challenges authority. Conflict then erupts.

During such times, when the bitterest of words have been exchanged, as the son finds his independence trampled on, his wishes quashed, he turns against his father, this man who had fed him, sheltered him, educated him, this man who was once so great. He thinks of his friends and the fathers that they have. The good times vanish from memory, the feel of that special relations they had both felt at one time or another, as he bites his lip and swallows hard, in the silence taking in the message in his father’s eyes.

“Whatever I may be, whoever I may be, you’re stuck with me.”

The message leaves no room for doubt; there’s just no such thing as trading fathers.

WALKING IN ONE AFTERNOON on a young father and his three-year-old so, I heard an exchange that simply made me smile. After many futile attempts to get his son to eat, the young father unleashed what was supposed to be the clincher: a threat used successfully before—to hand the boy over to a new father.

“Would you like that?” he asked.

The boy shook his head but still wouldn’t eat.

“Would you like a new Papa?”

Again the shaking of the head. Still the boy wouldn’t eat.

“You’d like a new Papa then?” the young father asked, this time with a sense of finality.

“Yes,” the boy answered.

A moment later came the spanking.

At some point we all probably stop to ask ourselves just how our lives might have been, how we might have turned out had fate handed us a different father, had we been born into a different family.

As a child I hardly knew my father. He was then the busiest of persons, holding two jobs to support his family, going to law school in the evening later on. We would see him only late at night, perhaps have a glimpse of him as he relaxed in front of the portable television in his room. When he finally had the time to spare, the distance had already been established. For the most part he was simply the figure of authority.

I was already in my tees when I began to really know the man. Long conversations and weekend trips helped the process along. The complexities of the relationship began to surface, the competition, with one “man” trying to outdo the man of the family—trying to get his own way, trying to prove his independence.

The disagreements and the disappointments came, and as they did I looked around, still playing the game of comparing fathers.

One day I saw how a friend put his arm around his father before all of us, his friends.

“My father,” he said with apparent pride.

And beside him his father smiled, a short man, a stout man, dark and rather balding.

Another time I listened as someone talked his own friends out of some mischief for fear of his father’s wrath.

I noticed how the son of one military officer hardly spoke or smiled, how he never even cracked a joke in the presence of his father.

The comparisons went on and on, from childhood to my late teens and early twenties, then it must have simply died a natural and quiet death. Perhaps there was just not more use to it. There was no more point.

Along the course of comparisons I must have reached that stage where I came to accept my father for what he is and what he isn’t, for his good points and despite his shortcomings, bearing no resentment for his absence during my early years and for all those things I never got—which, I eventually realized, I never really needed.

Despite the difficulties and the disagreements, it had worked out after all.

Somehow I never got to try making out a list of all those qualities I’d look for in a father. Or of all those things I’d expect from one. I guess further thought would have only made me see that after eliminating all those qualities and acts I never actually needed or wanted, I would end up with the father that I’ve had all these years.

The same one, in fact, from the long lost days of comparing fathers, when we never even bothered to find out if fathers themselves were comparing sons—and feeling just as we were.

When I held you last

2005-12-01T03:08:00.000+08:00

Is it even possible to forget?

I held you in my arms when there was no more life in you. I kissed your head and your feet. Before that, I watched you die. I knew I had to let you go.

Still, I had hoped the day would never come. I had always hoped that I would go before you.

I still cry.

I often relive that day. After all, it happened just months ago. It feels like years. Still, not a day goes by when I don’t remember that day I held you last. I never thought I could do it, but I did. It was my last gift to you.

I held you and gave you those gestures of love that I had given you for years.

To this day, I keep thinking, “Why did you leave me?”

2005-11-20T05:35:00.000+08:00

“Get over it”

How do you do that anyway?

One of the worst things anyone has to go through is to see a loved one in pain. Quite close to that is to see the loved one go. In the end, perhaps, death is easier than pain, and even in intense grief, you realize that death is better than to have your loved one go through further suffering.

There are experiences you simply can’t forget. They haunt you.

My father suffered a stroke in September last year, two days before my mother’s birthday. They never got to celebrate a golden wedding anniversary. It wasn’t meant to be.

The frenzy of that day is still so clear to me. I took all my cards, knowing there would be a lot of expenses. He was taken by ambulance to a hospital where he could at least be stabilized, then later that same day to a different hospital.

Looking back, it was all just a matter of prolonging the agony.

On that first night, I wept outside the hospital’s emergency room as doctors attended to my father.

Sixteen days later, with my father gone, I wept inside the neurological ICU as hospital personnel “prepared” him for the morgue and contacted doctors on their fees (most were “no charge” out of professional courtesy). I was alone then; I volunteered to stay there till my father could be taken to the morgue.

Later, in the evening, at the place where the viewing was to be held, I looked upon my father again, this time as he was about to be “prepared” for the wake. They had questions about how he was to look. The answers didn’t come easily.

My father died on a Sunday. He was cremated on a Thursday.

My mother wrote a letter to him. It remained in his coffin during the wake, unseen. When he was about to be cremated, I put the letter in his hands.

That was it.

There are things you never forget.

###

2005-11-12T02:18:00.000+08:00

"In fond memory of Dr. Bonifacio P. Sibayan, Ph.D"
Former president, Philippine Normal University
Former Commissioner, Commission on the Filipino Language
Former Editor-in-Chief, CEAP Perspective

Dear Sir,

I could have written this in my journal, but after some soul-searching, I decided not to do so. Perhaps I just wanted to pay some tribute to a great man, especially since I wasn’t able to attend your wake and your funeral. I’m sorry, Sir, I just didn’t know. I would have been there had I known, but I learned about it months later. And some time after that, I had my own deep personal losses to deal with.

I visited your grave for the first time last Monday. It was nice to see that your final resting place in this world looks well. I laid some flowers and a clipping of one of your articles there.

Quite appropriately, it rained.

You were a great man, Sir. The records will attest to that. This is my simple contribution.

Sir, I know you suffered a lot during the last five years or so of your life. You lost two sons. Your wife suffered from Alzheimer’s disease. Perhaps there was some sense of divine mercy that you passed away within a year of your beloved wife.

You had a great way of putting things. Back in 1993, while we were in Bacolod, a convention organizer invited you to attend a workshop. What did you say? “But workshops are talkshops!” At one time, you came to my home for some personal matters, and you remarked, “You’re like Edgar Allan Poe!” because of the glass of vodka before me .

I disappointed you a lot of times, but I can never forget how, at one time, you actually called me a friend. You may remember, Sir, that I was just close to 30 when we met. You were already 75.

You were my mentor in things professional and otherwise. I never dared to call you my friend, but how I enjoyed all those vegetarian meals we shared at Organix (now gone) along Jupiter St. Or even how we saw a certain Comelec official in an unexpected outburst at AIM. We really laughed then.

During our last lunch together, you said to me, “It doesn’t matter what you achieve. As long as you’ve raised good children, you’ve done well.”

The last time we talked, over the phone, we were supposed to have lunch again. It never happened.

I can no longer say “Take care,” Sir, because something in me says that now, far from us, you are happy with your wife and sons.

So please whisper a bit to whoever is in charge of the universe. Some of us who are still here could use some help.

I miss you, Sir. I really do.

###

2005-11-04T12:11:00.000+08:00

“Crying is contagious”

Today I attended the necrological services for a great-uncle of mine, the last of the male siblings to go. He was my mother’s favorite among them, because he was the one who welcomed her warmly into the family.

Following the mass, his daughter read an e-mail from one of her brothers who resides abroad. She then read a letter that she wrote to her father. During all this time, she was in tears. It had to take great courage to do what she did. There were times when it seemed she would not be able to continue, but she did…even though she kept crying and her hands trembled.

I never knew my great-uncle that well, if at all. Still, I had to try very hard to hold back the tears.

His demise couldn’t have been that much of a surprise. For years, he had been in a wheelchair following a stroke. He was under 24-hour care because of his condition. It was really just a matter of time.

Yet they cried. I nearly did. I didn’t want to cry because I thought it would be inappropriate, since we never knew really knew each other.

But to see his daughter cry was something else.

Crying is contagious. Loss is difficult. Loss is painful, whether the life lost was old or young.

Contrary to what some people say, growing old and gray isn’t fun. Death touches us at any age, but more so as we grow older. We lose the lives that nurtured us. We also lose the lives we nurtured. Which is more painful? I would think the latter. It has been so in my case anyway.

Then again, everyone has his or her own story to tell...and pain to bear.

###

2005-10-29T14:08:00.000+08:00

“Debating Our Future”

(Note: This was written in October 2003)

I can only sympathize with the people of Iraq. Looking at it from far away, from the perspective of both the conquered and the conqueror, I can’t help feeling that Americans get some kind of perverse pleasure from debating, and perhaps even determining, the future of a nation they know little of, and of a people they know even less of.

But coming as I do from the Philippines, I know whereof I speak.

My own third-world country is once more in the news, particularly those generating from US-based news organizations. Once more we find ourselves in the map of the world, as defined by the United States. Bad news for us, though the Philippine president and the White House may think otherwise.

We had a number of good years when America didn’t care, because it didn’t have a stake in what we did. But that was just too good to last. Now we’re back to the bad old days.

I leave any analysis of the pre-Marcos era to my elders. They know far more than I. But from the Marcos regime to its fall in 1986, to the shaky Aquino years with all its coup attempts, particularly the nearly-decisive December 1989 coup attempt where Bush the Elder practically saved the Aquino administration with the “persuasion flights” of US fighter planes, the United States had been a major determinant of Philippine political life.

During those years, it was always a matter of pleasing America.

Things changed, however, with the historic Philippine Senate vote in September 1991 to reject a treaty that would keep US military bases in the Philippines. No more US bases, no more US aid (or “rent” as we liked to call it), no more GIs spending their oh-so-wanted dollars for the company of “willing” Filipinas. Use your imagination to what that actually means.

That withdrawal of US military bases was supposed to be the death of the Philippines, if US and Philippine officials at the time were to be believed.

In a way it was.

Suddenly, America no longer cared. We had to have a great catastrophe and a lot of body bags to even find our way to CNN.

What a blessing that was for the Philippines.

Suddenly lost in the US and international media, the Philippines experienced a period of peace and, well, relative prosperity. Out of America’s graces, the country saw not a single coup attempt. Not even the threat of it.

Instead, we converted a former military base into an industrial and tourist zone that many Filipinos today are proud of, and quite rightly. We had, rather unbelievably in these troubled days, a coup-free presidency. We actually experienced economic growth. We had good years despite the Asian financial crisis. True, we later elected a bad president, but we also removed him through extra-constitutional means.

Then came 9/11. And a Philippine president, who ironically was sworn in on the same day George W. Bush was, determined to reconnect the umbilical cord to America.

Now we hear talk of military aid. Or aid of any kind. A case for Ripley, at the least.

As we found out in the Philippines on Saturday, October 18, George W. Bush in his address to a joint session of the Philippine Congress, couldn’t even pronounce the name of Jose Rizal, the Philippine national hero, right.

Give me insignificance, even anonymity, any time.

###

2005-10-28T22:06:00.000+08:00

“Open for business or closing shop?”

Is the Philippines open for business or is it closing shop?

The answer to that question will depend very much on where you’re coming from, geographically and metaphorically. If you’re a big business, you’ll probably say that the country is open for business. If you’re on the other end of the spectrum, you might feel otherwise.

I took a walk around my neighborhood today. For years now, I’ve been aware of the short life span of businesses in the area. I’ve often attributed that to faulty cash flow planning. The McDo, Jolibee, Shakey’s, Pizza Hut, and similar establishments in the area can survive. But how about the smaller establishments?

Put simply, so many have closed shop.

Even during the Estrada years, I knew that things were going bad. Today, I saw just how much worse they have become. Businesses that looked OK just months ago are no longer there. Years ago, I saw this in Makati, particularly in the Pasay Road area. Elsewhere, while riding the MRT, I saw how buildings along EDSA had become unoccupied.

“For rent”

“For lease”

Those words seemed to say just where we were. Or where we are now.

I live close to two top universities, two colleges, and a lot of other schools at the basic education level. If businesses can’t make it here, then there’s something very wrong in the economy.

No one wants to be pessimistic, but all those closed shops seem to point to something.

Oh by the way, even a Jolibee branch in the area has closed.

So is the Philippines open for business or is it closing shop?

###

2005-10-22T10:26:00.000+08:00

“Occupation is Ugly”

My country was occupied for centuries, by the Spanish, the Americans, and the Japanese. Some would say that the Spanish rule was more a colonization than an occupation, but the effects were still very much the same. Many would even argue that, up to 1992, the Philippines was under quasi-occupation by the United States, since American GIs could not be touched by Philippine authorities while there were US military bases in the country.

I remember the stories of World War II and the Japanese occupation of the Philippines. My father often recounted how he and his uncles looted the stores of the ethnic Chinese in their neighborhood, just so they could have something to eat.

They would find just raisins, though, but that was enough to survive. Food was so scarce.

Another story I can’t forget involved a family that killed their dog so they could have something to eat. At the table, when the dish was there, they couldn’t eat. After all, that was their beloved pet.

An uncle of mine still fumes at how he was slapped by Japanese soldiers if he didn’t greet them properly. His daughter doesn’t like to listen to such stories, because my uncle always curses every time he recounts them.

A great-uncle of mine was imprisoned because he was having so much fun watching dog-fights in Leyte, before the “liberation.” He was then on the roof of his house, and he was jumping in joy as he watched the planes going after each other.

My grandfather was imprisoned by the Japanese, then later by the Americans, both times at Fort Santiago. During the Japanese occupation, upon his release from Fort Santiago, he worked as a mason, even though he was a lawyer and a teacher by profession, and an honor graduate of the University of the Philippines.

But that’s an occupation. It’s ugly.

There’s nothing nice about it, particularly for the occupied. For the occupier, there’s home, even if its thousands of miles away. For the occupied, home is gone.

You’re a second-class citizen in your own land. You have no rights. It’s a blood-curdling thought, that an invading army can just barge into your house and hold your family, including your children, at gunpoint so they can search your home for weapons, information, or whatever.

Or perhaps haul you to the public square so someone in a mask can point out a suspected rebel, insurgent, or “terrorist.” In the Philippines, during the Japanese occupation, that person was called a “makapili” (someone who chooses). It was surprising to learn that the coalition forces in Iraq, according to some reports, had been using the same tactic. People in masks.

But that’s an occupation.

Occupation is ugly, and anyone who had been through a history of it can understand why there’s so much trouble in Iraq today. The basic principle is “You don’t belong there.”

Or, from the perspective of the occupied, “You don’t belong HERE.”

Perhaps it’s hard for a country like the United States, that has never been occupied, to understand (the colonial experience doesn’t count, unless it’s from the perspective of native Americans), Imagine the insult. To have foreign troops in your land dictating things. To have them barge into your homes without warrants. That’s enough to make you want to kill. Or to die in the process. After all, that’s all you have. There are practically no judicial processes when it comes to the occupier.

Then again, it’s an occupation.

America’s experiences with occupation have always been in another country. Thus, there was always the comfort of the thought that, at least, the family was safe.

There’s no such comfort for the occupied.

###

2005-10-20T05:51:00.000+08:00

"WHY NOT NEW YORK? ASK THE WORLD"

Just about everyone who knows about the Olympics dreams of watching the Games live, in person. I’m sure New Yorkers would have loved the chance to do so. Sorry, but apparently the world didn’t bite.

After all, no one outside the United States likes to have people shout “USA! USA! USA!” to his or her face. That was the experience of Salt Lake, or other international events held in the US. That’s an experience no one outside the United States wants repeated, especially where the Olympics are concerned.

Forget stadiums and logistics. It’s about hospitality.

A columnist once observed that hospitality was about making people feel comfortable, and that the opening ceremonies of the Salt Lake Winter Olympics were too much about the red, white and blue. Outside of Berlin, Salt Lake had to be the most politicized of Olympics (winter or summer), from George W. Bush’s statement (“On behalf of a determined nation…”), to the display of the torn flag, to that unending chant of “USA! USA! USA!”

Stupid world. We thought that the Olympics were about THE world.

Unfortunately, Americans tend to turn things around and make it about America. As someone in “Fox and Friends” once said during the lead-up to the Salt Lake Games, “No one cares about the Olympics. But people care about this country.”

Sorry, New York. Let’s have the Olympics somewhere else.

The Olympics are about camaraderie and friendly competition, not about flag-waving and in-your-face gloating. We love our respective nations, but we extend our hands to our competitors. We enjoy a victory. At the same time, we salute those we somehow managed to defeat.

We also welcome them to our land. That’s what being a host is all about.

The Olympics aren’t about fingerprinting and photos at the port of entry. If you’re not among the lucky people who don’t need a visa to get to the US, you’ll have to shelve out $100 just to apply for one…and get rejected. Goodbye $100, an entire month’s earnings for many people in developing nations. And you spend the amount just to get insulted by an embassy official.

Who needs that?

Can you imagine the kind of hype that would have come out of New York in a post-9/11 scenario? The US president, whether Republican or Democrat, would have surely invoked 9/11. Then the crowd would chant that, that, that…

Sorry, I can’t say it anymore.

And the rest of the world just watch in dismay. No one would feel welcome.

Ever been interrogated at a US airport? If you’re an Asian, they look at you and talk to you as if you’re a felon. At Vancouver, on the other hand, they smile at you. They welcome you.

Would New York have welcomed people outside of Europe and a few Asian countries? Perhaps. For Asians, though, the port of entry would be on the West Coast. And there, be prepared to be treated like a criminal.

I’d bet, however, that a lot of money would have been made from rejected visa applications.

“It’s the Olympics, I know, but you’re from the Philippines. You can’t go. You might not return to your country.”

Fine.

I’m sure New York is a lovely place with a lot of beautiful people. But not for the Olympics.

And so it’s London. Great. We’ll watch the Games from our television sets, assuming of course that we’re still alive in 2012. I’m sure the Brits will have a blast at the football (yes, football, not soccer) matches, shouting, “Goooaaaallll!!!!!”

Good for them.

###

2005-10-18T18:21:00.000+08:00

“The Dancer: A celebration of motion”

For a layman such as myself, sculpture may seem static. It’s often about poses, which could apply even to the best. Look around your home and you’ll probably find pieces with “posed figures.”

Ferdinand R. Cacnio’s “The Dancer,” on the other hand, is all about motion. It celebrates motion through dance. Dance also involves form, but in this case form is secondary. The object is to portray movement in something that doesn’t move.

Mr. Cacnio brings motion to something inanimate.

Because the pieces themselves have no titles, we have to go by description.

For the most part, motion in the pieces is expressed by the way the head, the arms, and the torso are positioned. There is a sense of movement. Another element is the attire. The skirts in some pieces enhance the expression of motion. The forms themselves show little difference in the sense that the bodies depicted are practically the same. The difference lies in how the movements of these bodies are expressed.

The pieces with wild twists may be more attention-getting, There are ballet moves. There are “formal” moves. There are pieces that feature rather wild dancing. Stay a while, however, to contemplate what would perhaps be considered the milder pieces. They’re more interesting because of their sensuality…and their mystery.

Three of the smaller sculptures are particularly seductive.

One features a dancer in a crouching position, with arms spread, her face looking sideways. Another features a dancer with her hands before her–tame compared to the others, but very mysterious. The third depicts a dancer with one arm down and one up, her torso tilted to her right as she looks down.

View these sculptures while alone. Viewing them with friends will get a lot a adjectives, but these pieces are best seen alone, when you can contemplate the motion and perhaps try to delve into the artist’s mind.

Mr. Cacnio’s works are currently on display at the Avellana Art Gallery along F.B.Harrison Street in Pasay City.

2005-10-16T09:59:00.000+08:00

“Dying and dyeing my hair”

On the day my father died, I dyed my hair.

It was getting white all over, and since I worked mostly with young people at the time, I had very practical reasons to keep it black. Still, it was the day my father died, after 16 days in an intensive care unit.

Since then, my hair has gone black and white over and over. And like the changes in the color of my hair, the grieving hasn’t stopped.

What struck me through the whole affair was the wealth of stories that an intensive care unit can present to a writer. For the most part, writers speak of pain. And there are few places where pain is more apparent than in an intensive care unit.

In our time at the hospital, we often saw and at times commiserated with an attractive young woman who was married to an elderly foreigner. Her husband had suffered a stroke, as had my father. She became kind of a friend.

Then there was this large family whose father was confined at the same intensive care unit. He died on the first Sunday night that my father spent at the hospital. I remember how one of his daughters burst into tears when he flatlined, even as several doctors tried to revive him. When they finally gave up, everyone was speaking on a cellphone.

“Tatay [father} is dead.”

While all that was happening, my own father was having trouble breathing, and my mother was in tears. But with the doctors’ care, my father survived that night. He survived more moons after that. Finally, he died.

That was on the 10th day of the 10th month, at 10:10 a.m.

And the thought came to me again, as it had many times during the entire episode: I could write about all this.

What a horrible thought to have at such a time. Even worse, to dye my hair.

Perhaps, till then, I had been at least relatively content with how my life was going. Pain is a writer’s resource. Frankly, despite the material that pain provides, I can do without it.

I’d rather have my father back.

Later that day, at a mid-afternoon meal at the hospital canteen while waiting for my father’s remains to be released, someone chuckled, having noticed that I actually dyed my hair that day, particularly my mustache and my beard.

I chuckled as well, but with a sense of guilt.

Perhaps it was an acknowledgment that life does actually go on, even in the event of death. It sounds flimsy, I know, but still…

###

2005-10-16T09:51:00.000+08:00

“Death Watch”

Tonight I’m on a death watch.

So close to where I write this now, five puppies, born just a little more than 48 hours ago, are sleeping with their mother. One puppy is dying. He apparently had some accident at birth. He was the last to come out, so I was already asleep by then and thus never saw what actually happened. My vet feels that, in the process of his mother peeling away at the placenta, part of his head’s skin was torn off, thus exposing his skull.

I had hoped we could save him. Just yesterday he was as active as any day-old puppy. Today I came home to find him very weak, despite the remedies my vet had prescribed. He isn’t even suckling anymore. He just sleeps. I guess it is a quiet way of dying. That doesn’t make it any easier.

I’ve already shed my tears, but most probably not all of them yet. In a way, however, I’ve already said goodbye.

Now I wait. Already I grieve.

As a writer for many years now, I’ve always been intrigued by the mystery of death. What actually goes on in the mind of one surely dying during those final moments? Only the dead can say for sure.

Many years ago, at the same time that my writing career was finally making some headway, my uncle, blindfolded and hog-tied in the bathroom of the house of his common-law wife, bled to death from stab wounds inflicted by his own driver and several others.

What were his thoughts then, at that last moment of life, knowing he was dying in a home and in the company of a woman his legal wife never even knew about?

All these years, I’ve never found the words to even describe that moment. I could only imagine, and guess.

Just as I watch over a lovely little puppy dying (dying quietly, thank God for little favors)…and think of how, had he been lucky enough, he could have made some kid or daddy or granddaddy out there so happy.

And me as well.

###

2005-10-16T09:40:00.000+08:00

KILLING WORDS: THE LANGUAGE OF WAR AND OCCUPATION

Were the four Americans who died in Fallujah killed, slain, massacred, murdered or executed? Were they civilians, mercenaries, armed security personnel, or civilian combatants?

Anyone who has lived in a country that’s been occupied knows that there’s no distinction between an occupier in uniform and one in civvies. They’re both legitimate targets. After all, they pursue the same goals. They both benefit from the occupation—the civilian occupiers, whatever their names or designations may be, perhaps even more since they, after all, have a choice.

They can be there or not.

Soldiers, on the other hand, simply obey.

But even where soldiers are concerned, the language of war and occupation seems to tilt toward the occupier’s favor, especially if the occupier is supported by news organizations.

Describing what he felt upon seeing American soldiers inspecting an Iraqi home, CNN correspondent Martin Savidge said that the Marines were “trying to clear a village, a town. And they're trying to control a population, and that there are embedded within that population, people trying to murder them at that moment.”

What a novel concept: invading soldiers being “murdered.”

Now the Japanese can claim that their soldiers were “murdered” as they enforced the occupation in many Asian countries during World War II.

Too bad for the Japanese. They didn’t have CNN or Fox News to promote their “liberation” of Asia.

Had they had that privilege, resistance forces would have been called terrorists.

Today we have GIs in Iraq raiding homes without warrants and “detaining” suspected terrorists and insurgents. Iraqis, however, “abduct” foreign civilians aiding in the occupation.

Coalition forces “detain prisoners.” Iraqis “kidnap hostages.”

If it sounds crazy, well, it is. Many of the heroes of World War II, by the standards of today’s international news organizations, would be considered thugs and terrorists.

There’s more.

A US “civilian administrator” closes down a newspaper in Iraq. Elsewhere, “dictators” do very much the same thing.

The difference? Sorry, can’t find it.

We can perhaps forgive US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld when he said, “Well, we know the Iranians have been meddling, and it's unhelpful to have neighboring countries meddling in the affairs of Iraq. And I think the Iraqi people are not going to want to be dominated by a neighboring country, any neighboring country. No country wants to be dominated by its neighbors.”

Perhaps it escaped him that the US is in fact dominating Iraq. Then again, the United States is not a neighboring country, so maybe that makes it all right.

But that’s Rumsfeld. The sophistry is expected.

When it comes from respected journalists and news agencies, however, it makes sense for people to switch their channels from Fox News and CNN to, say, Al Jazeera.

That is, if you can get it, and understand Arabic.

###

Welcome

2005-03-06T01:01:00.000+08:00

Welcome to my blog.
Some of the things you may read in here, you may not like, depending on where you come from or where you're coming from.
The pieces may be irreverent. Oftentimes they go against popular (or seemingly popular) beliefs and attitudes. You might even find some downright nasty. I hope not, though.
Give me a day or two to get started.
I'm well past the midway point in my life, but I'm still new at this.