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.
Monday, December 31, 2007
Saturday, December 29, 2007
In memoriam, Garpy Dec. 29, 1982-August 10, 1991, on the anniversary of his birth
"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
Friday, December 21, 2007
The gift-giver (A Christmas story of a different sort)
(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.
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.
###
Sunday, December 16, 2007
In memoriam, Almond Dec. 16, 1994-June 2, 2007, on the anniversary of her birth
One of my brightest lights is gone.
My world is darker now.
Friday, December 14, 2007
Ashes to ashes
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.
###
Thursday, December 13, 2007
So what for silent nights
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)
(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.
###
Monday, December 10, 2007
The madman comes
Published in Prime Weekly under the column “Still Life,” April 27, 1989
“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.
###
Friday, December 07, 2007
Mock the Executioner
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.
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.
###
Thursday, August 30, 2007
TAKE MY FATHER…PLEASE!
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.
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.
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