Category Archives: Gradtitude

Childhood, Children, Faith, Family, Gradtitude, Life, Love, Women

Did she feel the same way I do?

1 Comment

May 12, 2019. Mothers’ Day.  This morning, at mass, Fr. Chris told us that aside from God, we will only feel real, unconditional love from one other person, and that is not our love partner, but our mother.  He urged each of us to thank our mother and let her feel our love, while she is here.

I am fortunate to have my mother, Pilar or Dada as we fondly call her, still with us.  White-haired, a little bent, much weaker, a bit forgetful,  but still as beautiful as ever, Dada is now 84.  She’s been through the toughest of times, having been widowed at 32 with five young children to bring up in a foreign land.

A no-nonsense, practical woman, she converted our house in the university belt to a boarding house, woke up each day at dawn to go to market, cook for her family and her boarders, get us ready for school, bring us lunch every day, tutor us when we got home, attend our school events, and love us unconditionally.  She never remarried, and instead concentrated on taking care of us.  And when we had all grown up, finished schooling, started working, fallen in love, gotten married and started having kids, she took it upon herself to take care of her grandchildren.  Her love for us is boundless, limitless.

She was very strict, and there was a phase when we were very young that we got spanked almost every day for being naughty.  Spanking stopped when my father died, and my mom had to work really hard to take care of us.  I could see that life was difficult, but mom never complained.  I vowed to finish my studies right away so I could take care of her and the family.  I was hard-headed, strong-willed and impetuous, and must have given my mom quite a few headaches over the years, as did all of us children.

Drawing on my own experiences as a mother, I began to reflect on what it must have been for her as a young mother, far from her native Spain.

I wonder if she felt the same kind of excited ‘want to shout this news to the world,’ yet partly apprehensive love that springs forth when first she learned she was expecting me or my siblings.  Did she worry too, when her body began to change?  When she felt  that first kick and realized that there’s this other person growing within, did she wonder what lay ahead?  Did she also wonder what her children will be like? What kind of persons they will become? And if her children will love her too?

Did she, like me, feel that awesome love that takes root in a mother’s heart that precious moment when first we see our child, carry her in our arms and realize that life will never be the same?  That this little person will always come first, and that our lives will be intertwined forever?

Did she feel that tender, nurturing love when we cradle the baby in our arms and croon her to sleep?  The ‘grit your teeth, bite your lips’ dogged kind of love that lets her suckle, even when your nipples bleed, or carry her for hours even when your back aches.

Did she, like me, have that fierce, determined drive to protect our children from harm, and to discipline and guide them to develop the values they need to survive.  Did it break her heart too each time her children cried from scruffed knees, doctor’s visits, failed quizzes, childhood scrapes, and later from the disappointments of break-ups or misunderstandings?

Did she feel proud when her children garnered honors at school, or acted in a play, or won a school competition?  Did she too have that gut-wrenching feeling of seeing her children grieve over their father’s death, and of not knowing how to kiss this kind of pain away?  How did she manage to pick up the shattered pieces and patch everything back so that her children will feel secure?  How was she able to console her grieving children, when she couldn’t even breathe from pain herself?

Did she too experience the same hurt, when my once adoring children, now teenagers, begin to question me or worse rebel, and I feel them slipping away to become their own person, making their own decisions and living life apart from me?

Did she revel when she realized, like I do now, that the babies I once cradled in my arms, are now full-grown men and women?  That these children can now stand on their own.  Live.  Laugh.  Love.  That they in many, many ways are a better me.  And that somehow along the way, I must have done something good for them to turn out so well.

As I watched my children in the kitchen cook a special Mother’s Day lunch for Dada and me, I whispered a prayer of thanks to the Lord for blessing me with the inestimable joys of motherhood and for allowing me a taste of heaven here on earth.

Thank you, Dada, for bringing me into this world, and for loving me the same way Abuela loved you, with the same kind of unconditional love that makes women soldier on no matter what, through all the pains and heartaches of motherhood.  Indeed, we carry our mother and our mother’s mother, and all the mothers before us, in our heart.  As will our daughters do, some day.

Accountability, Beginnings, Childhood, Children, Church, Confidence, Death, Differences, Discipline, Faith, Family, Food, Forgiveness, God, Gradtitude, Health, Life, Love, Principles, Resilience, Women, Work

Remembering the Iturralde Sisters

6 Comments

Invariably, whenever I would bump into an older graduate of the College of the Holy Spirit where I studied, I would be asked, “How is Miss Maria Luz? How is Dean Julia Iturralde?” And then they would launch on how the two sisters left an indelible impression on them, how much they missed them, and how thankful they are for the values and learning they received.   Sadly I would tell them that my two aunts, younger sisters of my father, had passed on.

My brothers and I grew up in the family compound right behind the Basilica of San Sebastian. My mother was widowed early, and so we were raised in a maternal environment: my mom, my father’s mom Lola Ingga, my father’s aunt Lola Teta, and my two maiden aunts: Julia and Maria Luz. My father had another sibling, Tita Rory, but she had entered the nunnery and became a Sister Servant of the Holy Spirit (SSpS) and so we hardly saw her.

My two aunts figured largely in my growing up years, and this is my tribute to the two women who I love dearly.

Maria Luz Iturralde

My godmother and aunt, Maria Luz Alvaro Iturralde died in the wee hours of December 31, 2008 while I was in Texas. I can still remember my sister Pinky’s sobbing voice trying to tell me the sad news over the phone, which she had received from Paz, my sister-in-law in San Francisco, who had in turn been called by my brother Paul. The news had traveled swiftly around the world.

I quickly called my mother in Manila. She had not even heard the news yet. All she knew was that my brother Paul had brought Maria Luz to the hospital at midnight. Then, I woke up Bea and asked her to go to Quiapo to be with my mom and help out with arrangements. Like real troopers, my daughters Bea and Cara, with their cousin Monchoy, took charge of the wake while my brother Paul made the funeral arrangements.

The rest of us siblings (Johnny, Pepito, Pinky and I) felt helpless being so far away. All I could do from the other side of the globe was write down my memories of our aunt for an online memorial. Maria Luz loved to write. This was the best way I could think of to pay her tribute.

Maria Luz or Lucy or Frenchie as her friends would call her or Dada Uds as her grand nieces and nephews called her was a writer non par. She was the longest running moderator of Action (1947-51), Veritas (1980-94), The Profile, and The Faculty Review. Udsy was also the editor of The Search and We the Alumnae. She was an excellent writer and would write under the monicker Sub-Rosa (or chismis queen). I remember many trips to the National Printing Press in Quezon Avenue to check on various publications. She guided the exhibit for the College of the Holy Spirit’s 75th anniversary.

An English teacher at the College of the Holy Spirit, Udsy dedicated herself to helping students learn to love the English language. Quick-witted, she entertained her students with stories about family and life, making her dearly beloved to all of them. She was my English teacher as well, from the time I learned how to speak, read and write. In college, I studied English under her. She prodded me into writing and editing for the school paper. My baptismal godmother, she was always there to watch over me and guide me. And I had to study extra hard to make sure that I earned good grades.

She taught for 49 years at the school that she loved with all her heart, and was guidance counselor for a long time. I remember her anguished crying when she was replaced as the guidance counselor. Her life revolved around that school, and when she was forced to retire, she was terribly disheartened. Writing and editing kept her alive, and when she was removed by the CHS Alumnae Foundation as editor-in-chief of We the Alumnae on the pretext that the newsletter would now be computerized, she lost all interest in life.

As a young girl, Udsy excelled at sketching. Sports-minded, she won two trophies for marathon running. She studied Elementary Education for Teaching Children at Holy Ghost College (now College of the Holy Spirit).

A frequent visitor of the school’s bodega when she was a youngster, Udsy was always sent there for being the naughtiest girl in school. She was the bane of Erundina Fernandez (who later, for a time, became my mother-in-law and wrecked her revenge on me), Teofisto Guingona who called her “kabayo” because of her kicking him with her boston, and Alejandro Reyes who later became dean at San Beda.

Udsy was brave to the point of carelessness. During the Japanese occupation, a man was shot by the Japanese on our street. Without thinking of her own safety, she ran to him to give him the Last Rites. She would always take the side of the oppressed, and if she felt any of us were being given a hard time, she would take it upon herself to defend us.

Udsy loved to clean. Cleaning was her thing. She was very OC about this. The wooden staircase was not acceptable until it was gleaming. Her room was off limits to all us, unless it was story-telling time. She never liked the kitchen, and could not cook as far as I know. Kitchen duties were reserved for her sister Julia. But, oh, how she loved to eat! To the very end, she was always hungry, even if she had just eaten five minutes before.

Story telling was her thing. And for this, no one came even close. She was a master storyteller. And we lapped it all up.

I always credited my love of reading and literature to Udsy. When my brothers and I were young, we didn’t enjoy the usual fairytales like Goldilocks and the Three Bears, or Cinderella or Snow White. Instead, Udsy would regale us with stories of Greek, Norse and Roman mythology. Zeus, Hera, Aphrodite, Poseidon, Apollo, Athena, Hades and Ulysses. These were our heroes and heroines. The Three Fates – Clotho, Lachesis and Atropos – caused me nightmares. When would Atropos cut the string of my life, I anguished? Why, before The Lord of the Rings became a hit serial movie, we knew the entire story from beginning to end.

We eagerly looked forward to her payday because she would bring us to Goodwill in Escolta or to Bookmark and Alemars in Avenida Rizal and let us buy whatever book we desired to read. We had a complete collection of Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew books. When I got into my teens, she even indulged my love of Barbara Cartland and pocketbook love stories. On my 16th birthday, she got me a dozen pocketbooks. That was a special day!

Hot-tempered, Udsy easily got agitated. But when she was calm, she was very gregarious. She was always the life of the party, or so I remember. She would force my brothers and I to perform for her guests (mostly nuns, teachers and students) during parties at home. We had to recite a poem, dance or sing. Rock-a-bye-baby and Joyce Kilmer’s Tree Poem were favorites of mine.

When Udsy was angry, she was like a grenade, hurting everyone within reach. It was wise to stay out of her way. She would run over everyone. She would fly off the handle if she could not find a book, and would accuse us of getting it without permission. But when she would find it, her way of apologizing was to treat us to a Coke. And, oh, how she loved to drink Coke!

She wanted us to be serious about our studies, and thought anything unrelated to school work was the Devil’s work. One time, I was invited to become a model. Udsy was so angry, she threw a basin of water from her second floor window over the agents who came to take my photo. Naturally, that was the end of my budding modeling career.

Near-sighted in one eye, Udsy always wore glasses for as long as I can remember. Red lipstick was her trademark. She kept her shiny black hair short and hated it when white hair started to appear. She commissioned us to pick out her white hair with tweezers and would pay us a centavo for every three white hair we got out. She had her breasts removed when she was in her early twenties because of a cancer scare. She told me the surgeon made a mistake and took out her good breast, and when he realized his error, removed her other breast. She heard him talking about his mistake during her operation through the haze of her anesthesia. This caused her lifelong fear of doctors and medicine. Otherwise, she was in the pink of health for most of her life, all 5’4” and 98 lbs.

Udsy secretly admired my late husband, Mike, and would cut out his articles from different newspapers, save them in a brown envelope and give them to me each time I visited San Sebastian.

In her later years, Udsy became schizophrenic, thinking everyone was out to get her. It was truly sad seeing her fall into deep depression. She would physically hurt her caregivers, and so we decided to put her into a nursing home in Calamba run by nuns. We felt then that she and my aunt Julia would have better care there. We brought the family’s Christ the King statue to Calamba to watch over them. I was relieved though when my brother decided to bring them back home to San Sebastian. This was their home where they were happy.

Julia Alvaro Iturralde

On February 8, 2015 while vacationing in Rome. I received word from my mom that my father’s only remaining sibling, Julia Alvaro Iturralde had passed away. In a way, I was relieved. She had been ill for a very long time, her brilliant mind long gone, her once robust body withered and thin. She still managed a cherubic toothless smile whenever I would visit and remind her that I was Monette, her niece. Sometimes she would remember me. The last time, she did not, and it saddened me greatly. She asked why it was taking her parents long to fetch her.

Julia was born on October 7, 1931 to Jose Manalo Iturralde and Dominga Alvaro. The youngest in a brood of six, Julia or Jill as she was fondly called, was an extremely intelligent individual. She graduated Magna Cum Laude with an AB-BSE degree from Holy Ghost College, and finished two masteral programs: Master in Sociology from Ateneo University and Master of East Asian Studies from Radcliffe, where she enjoyed a scholarship. Jill held the deanship of the Liberal Arts Department of the College of the Holy Spirit for 23 years. She was also moderator of Action, Veritas and The Profile from 1964-67. A prolific poetess, Jill expressed her emotions in beautiful words.

My first recollection of Tita Jill (and later Dada Nings), as we fondly called her, was playing in my grandmother’s warm kitchen with a white porcelain tea set decorated with flowers that she had given me. I must have been less than three then. Pouring real milk tea in the tiny cups, she sat with me on the floor, and we pretended that we were having guests over. Sometimes, we would collect the moss in the garden, place them on the tiny plates and pretend it was salad. Other times, I got lucky and we actually ate food that had just been cooked in the kitchen.

When she came back from taking her masters at Radcliffe University, she brought home a huge walking doll for me. Oh, how I loved that doll with curly blonde hair! It was almost as tall as I was.

Tita Jill taught me how to pray before I slept: “Angel of God, my guardian dear, to whom God’s love entrusts me here. Ever this day be at my side, to light and guard, to rule and guide. And if I die before I wake, I pray the Lord, my soul to take. Amen.”

Summers, when we were growing up were spent in that kitchen. She would teach us how to bake, decorate cakes, and then let us experiment in the kitchen. I remember crying when my cake didn’t rise because I had forgotten to put baking powder in the mix. My brothers and I would fight as to who would clean up the leftover fudge in the bowl.

I loved watching how she cooked, and she would let me be her little assistant, though I was not allowed to wield a knife. I was assigned to mixing food. Getting egg whites to stiffen up was the hardest task ever. “Whip it 100 times, Monette, and don’t lift the spatula up or the air would escape,” she would admonish me. I would try valiantly to soldier on even if my arms felt like they were about to fall off. Looking back, I realize now that she had nurtured my interest in food.

Dada Nings taught Asian Studies at the College of the Holy Spirit, and to drive home learning, she would host parties at our ancestral home in San Sebastian for her students. They would cook Asian dishes, and wear dresses from the different countries they were assigned. My personal favorite was her sukiyaki. I loved watching them prepare the food, and then perform Asian songs or dances after. Oh, that was a lot of fun!

And she made life fun for her nieces and nephews. On Holy Saturdays, she would herd us into the dining room, give each of us a brush, and we would paint dozens of eggs for the Easter Egg Hunt the next day. I guess she must have hidden the eggs in the garden while we slept because we had fun hunting for them after mass on Easter Day.

We would have our own version of Flores de Mayo. We would dress up as saints using her clothes and stack of ribbons and scarves, parade up and down the house, then have a raffle of little knickknacks that she would collect. Oh, and we were not the only ones who had fun dressing up under her guidance. Her students were also in on it. I remember one Marian festival where she had her students dress up as different versions of Mama Mary and stand up like statues around the garden by the CHS Mendiola chapel.

She was a consummate writer, poet and story teller. She wrote plays about the Old Testament which her students performed in school. She wrote poems for the school paper, the CHS alumnae newsletter, and later for the newsletter she and her sister Maria Luz put up. She penned a book entitled Family Treasures which revealed all of the Iturralde secret recipes, and which I use to this day. Her friends gathered some of her poems and published them together with pieces written by my other two aunts, Maria Luz and Sister Encarnacion.

Early on, she encouraged us to perform during parties at home (Actually, I think a better word would be mandated). We either had to sing, dance, or recite a poem to the guests who invariably were their fellow teachers and nuns from the College of the Holy Spirit.

She was a very kind soul, soft-spoken, and yet you knew you were in deep trouble if you ever crossed the line. When I was in first year college, a classmate from elementary asked if she could visit me at home on a Saturday. I had not seen her for some time and was excited to see her. She came to the house with her father who was an advertising executive. A popular soft drink brand was giving away a car to the lucky person who found the tansan (bottle cap) with the winning mark. Apparently, he was running the contest, and he told me that he would make sure I would win the car, but in return I would have to sell the car and split the proceeds with him. I was to let him know my decision on Monday.

Naturally, I was very much tempted. Since my father died when I was ten, we were hard up. The funds would come in handy so I could pursue my dream of studying law, buy things I’ve always wanted, give my family a more comfortable life. At that time, I was studying on scholarship. I discussed the options with my Tita Jill, who advised me of the importance of being true to the values of honesty and integrity. That night, she gave me two cards she had drawn. Depending on my decision, I was to open one of the cards. That weekend was excruciatingly difficult for me. I decided to turn down the offer, and opened the card. Here’s what was written:

“Dear Monette,

You lost. W-a-a-a-a-h… sob sob… Boo hoo… Boo hoo. Hikbe… Sniffle… Sniffle… 

But to me, after Monday, you are taller than a giraffe, taller than Empire State, taller than Mt. Everest.

You are one of us – born losers whose poverty is their (sic) our wealth.

At any rate, I’m so proud of you, so proud that I can treat you to a Shakeys pizza tonight!!!

Love,

Ninang

October 23, 1975″

And then, I opened the other card. It said simply:

“Dear Mongga,

Hooray!! Tsup!!!

Love,

Nings”

I knew then that she was very proud of me for making the right decision. That for me was the most beautiful gift she had ever given me. I treasure those two cards to this day.

I always wanted to study Fine Arts but we didn’t have the funds for this. But the summer after the softdrink incident, Tita Jill enrolled me in a summer class in painting at CHS. I was in heaven! The next summer, she enrolled me in theatre class, along with my brother Pepito.

She was always looking for ways to encourage our various interests. I remember the day the encyclopedia set she had purchased arrived. Pepito and I who were in grade school then were so excited, we spent the entire summer reading the encyclopedia from A to Z. We also played Scrabble and Monopoly with her. Tita Jill’s bed could be spotted a mile away because of the mountains of books and papers that littered it.

College studies was a different matter. Because I was on scholarship (which was the only way I could afford studying at CHS), I had to study very, very hard. It was made more difficult because my aunts worked at the school: Sr. Encarnacion taught Theology, Maria Luz headed the English Department, and Julia served as dean of Liberal Arts. They were stricter on me than anyone else, because they wanted to prove that I could make it on my own. They were thus ecstatic when I graduated with a Summa cum Laude.

Although she was the youngest sibling of my father, Tita Jill appeared to be the head of the family when it came to decision making. She was always protecting her older sister from harm. When Tita Jill and Tita Udsy (Maria Luz) were forced to retire from CHS, they started a newsletter to keep their minds busy. I suspect that Tita Jill used her retirement funds for this as Tita Udsy who had unceremoniously been removed as editor-in-chief of We, the Alumnae, had gone into deep depression. She wanted to make her sister happy. Tita Jill bought a computer and learned to use it.

Things got worse when my cousin Jose Rene and his mother Vicente died and Tita Jill was left to cope with the legal issues on inheritance. The stress was too much for her, and she suffered one stroke after the other, with complications from diabetes. She lost her eyesight, and this was a crushing blow to someone who was as widely read as her. As the years went by, she became less and less interested in life, and would just lie down, seeming to wait for her parents to come and fetch her. And now, they have finally and they are all reunited in their real home in heaven, with Christ.

Though I miss them terribly, I am happy that they are now at peace. I thank the Lord for the gift of having had them both as my aunts, and will always keep them in my heart. May they rest in God’s embrace forever.

Death, Family, Food, Gradtitude, Life, Love, music

A Different Twist to Valentine’s Day

8 Comments

10393981_10204422523537442_5957064915388831964_nValentine’s Day 2015.  This was not how I imagined the day would be months ago when everything was coming up roses.  I had a new love, or should I say he found me, but now he’s gone ahead to heaven, leaving me alone with a broken heart.  Just as the love of my life, my husband, my best friend and father of my children did earlier.  So now, I have two angels up above.  And a heart full of grief that needs to mend.  And must.  And will!

I arrived from Rome the other day, sick as a dog.  My son Niccolo picked me up from the airport.  Before going home, we passed by St. Therese of the Child Jesus, to visit Mike, pray and tell him how much we loved and miss him.

The stress of the past three weeks had finally caught up on me.  Acute bronchitis, the doctor said, and ordered strict bed rest.  But this was not possible as my dear aunt Julia, former dean of the College of the Holy Spirit and youngest sister of my father, had died while I was in Rome.  There was a wake to attend to and a burial to make.  Just as I had before I left for Spain two weeks ago.  It seemed that sorrow had decided to burrow a permanent hole in my heart.

Tita Jill had helped take care of me and my four siblings, aged four to 11, when my father had died. There was no way I would stay away.  I arranged for mass last night and early this morning just before her burial in the family plot in La Loma Cemetery.  From her friends’ tributes, I learned how much she had enriched their lives with her gentleness, her brilliance, her passion for excellence, her generosity of heart and her simplicity.  What a role model she was for all of us!

I could not help but compare the two wakes and burials that straddled my trip to Spain and Italy.  That of my boyfriend Rolando Perez Gosiengfiao’s was elaborate, chockfull of family and friends paying their respects throughout the day and night, flowers lining up the corridor, a flag draped over his coffin and smart marines standing guard beside his casket.  Each night a different group (Young Presidents’ Organization, World Presidents’ Organization, AIESEC, BCDA, GenRex) hosted the mass and dinner, paying tribute to a great man who had touched their lives and left an imprint hard to erase.  My aunt’s was simple, with only intimate family and friends present.  But love abounded nevertheless.  What struck me was no matter how brilliant or rich or powerful one is, at the end of our lives, we don’t take anything with us.  Except for the love we had shared with those we leave behind.

After the burial, Bea and I had brunch at Wildflour.  I sampled cacio e pepe pasta for the very first time on her prodding. It’s a wonder I didn’t have this in Rome. It was sinfully delightful, but more than the food, it was the company that made brunch truly special.  For how many moms can have the pleasure of lunch with their first born on Valentine’s Day, especially if their daughter is such an attractive young woman that many would like to date?  I felt honored that my daughter had decided to turn down all Valentine date requests to spend the day with me.

After brunch, we meandered over to the Saturday Salcedo market, bought flowers and passed by San Antonio in Forbes to say a prayer for Mr. G, as Bea calls Rollie.  We then went home to comply with my  doctor’s orders.

And lo and behold, a surprise awaited us!  Since my birthday, the house has been dusty and topsy-turvy due to renovation.  Blue burlap had covered the area on the ground floor where walls were being removed, and new panels put up.   Before leaving for Spain, I had decided to take the plunge and fix the large first floor room which had previously served as an office, and later as an entertainment room.

When Mike took ill with cancer and could no longer make the trip up to the second floor, that became his sick room.  It was also where he took his final breath and died in my arms as I had promised him.  The room was just too sad for me, and so I hardly entered it.  But my mom was getting on in age, and was having a hard time going up the stairs, so I decided it was time to make the change.  I also had excellent advice from Rollie on what to do with the room.

When Bea and I got home this afternoon, we were greeted by a wonderful sight.  The workers had removed the burlap covering the renovations ongoing in the living room, and the place had opened up.  It was now spacious, airy, and bright! Oh, what a wonderful feeling it evoked!  And I now have a sitting room full of natural light to paint in.  What joy!

Tonight, I had dinner in bed with Bea.  She prepared her signature tomato and basil pasta, and we had cheese and Spanish ham paired with a Vin de Bordeaux, while watching The Mummy Returns, and then Sex in the City on TV.  Cara is working in Boracay and Niccolo spent the day in Clark with his friends.  Now, Bea has gone to bed, and here I am writing and reflecting on my life these past few months.

Come to think of it, this was Rollie’s gift for me: a new lease on life.  Seven months ago, when my world was dark and I was grieving for Mike, Rollie came barging into my life.   Rollie taught me it was possible to love and be happy once again.  From the moment he sent me that message on FB, I was literally hooked.

How it all beganRollie was always looking for ways to get together, whether for halo-halo, picking me up from an event, offering to help me with my speeches, going to the Saturday market at Salcedo, driving me to Alfonso,  showing me where he grew up, or accompanying me to buy gifts.  He would sometimes show up unannounced where I was, seeming to have just been in the vicinity. Little did I know that it had been carefully planned.

He was a man of many inconsistencies.  Every chance he got, he would introduce me to his family and friends and would post our photos proudly on his Facebook page, tagging me whenever he could.  And yet he told me not to write about him because he was a private individual.  And so I would untag him.  At times, exasperated, I would unfriend him, but he always asked me back.  And truth to tell, no matter how many fights we had, we never could stay away from each other more than a day.

We had long conversations, yes, even arguments, about everything under the sun, especially religion, marriage, my church service, my busy schedule, and social customs.  Rollie was a professed atheist, and this cut me deeply, being quite religious.  It was hard to reconcile that the man I loved did not believe in the same things I did.  I refused to eat with him unless we said grace before meals.  He was very gracious and obliged me in this.  He even accompanied me to mass, though he would not stay all the way to the final blessing.

I kept looking for ways to tell him our relationship could not flourish. One time, I told him our Chinese astrology signs were opposed.  He was a tiger and I was fire monkey.  And since monkeys and dragons were the best match (Mike was a water dragon), I said I must find myself a dragon.  He was so cut up by this remark that he stopped talking to me, and told me I win.  When I saw him, he was crying in his living room.  When I asked him why he was crying, he said he wanted desperately to be my dragon.  Oh, Rollie!

Facebook messenger was our lifeline, a surprising channel for two mature individuals. Like teenagers, we were glued to our mobile phones, waiting for the three dots to start blinking.  The roles had been reversed.  My children would tell me to stop looking at my phone all the time.

Christmas Card largerIt was sad that my children could not accept our relationship.  Early on, Rollie told me he had fallen in love with my family, and looked forward to being part of it.  He said he was taken by the love that we all obviously shared.  But he was also understanding that it was just too soon after Mike had died.  All things will work out in the end, he said.  He was so sure of it.

Plans, Rollie had a lot of.  Where we would live, where we would travel, what we would do for the rest of our lives.  He gave me keys to his condo, and asked me to move in.  I told him not unless we were married.  Which again brought up the issue of social customs.  If we lived in the US, this would not even be an issue, he would argue. Why were papers so important, he asked?  I told him it was a matter of values, not papers.  Frustrated,  he announced he would put up our pictures in his condo to make me feel more at home.  I was in tears when his housekeeper in Hong Kong told me at the funeral that he bought a frame on this last trip and told her this was for my photo in Salcedo.  He never got around to doing it.

For some unknown reason, Rollie unleashed the poet in me. I would find myself penning my emotions in rapid fire, in a fever of inspiration.  I would send my poems to him, and each time, he would catch his breath, amazed at what I had written, and flattered to be the subject of the muse.

We painted together, and he loved the work I did, even blowing up a sketch I had made of him. He was very proud of that likeness of him that he put it up in his living room.  For Christmas, Rollie bought me a set of oils from New York after he saw me throw away my old oil set that had dried up.

Rollie loved music, and singing. He brought music back into my life.  We would sit and listen to music, and sometimes, he would burst into song.   He sang for me at his brother Ed’s birthday, and his sister-in-law whispered to me that it was obvious Rollie was in love with me, and that she hoped I loved him too.

Although he said he envied my writing skills, he showed me a book he had written on his wife after she died and another one he had written about his family. I was very touched by his gesture of love. He encouraged me to write a book for my mom’s 80th birthday and collaborated with me by digitalizing all the old photo prints.

Last year, Rollie urged me to write a book on Mike to celebrate our life together and to close that chapter so we could start a new one.  I was unable to write during the Christmas break because I was sick, so when Rollie said he was going to be away the week Pope Francis came, he told me I should start on that book for Mike.  And that was what I did.  He called me from Hong Kong to check how I was doing.  When I told him I had spent the better part of the weekend crying while writing and that I was only half way done, he told me to “Keep going, my courageous girl.  I love you!”

I admired the way Rollie fixed his home. He had impeccable taste.  He would bring me flowers and plants for my house, telling me that they livened up the house.  Rollie convinced me to renovate my house, to dispel the sadness that had permeated it and to bring back the happiness that was there before.  He disliked my white lights and advised me to change all my bulbs to warm white for a cozier feel.

On his last trip to Hong Kong, Rollie biked all the way to Shamshuipo to buy LED lights to surprise me and taught me how to change my lights. He was supposed to come to my house at 4pm to start on the lights the afternoon he died. He never made it home.

Living a fit life was something Rollie embraced with a passion. He biked, swam, watched his food intake, made sure he had eight hours of sleep a day.  To keep up, I bought a bike which he promised he would teach me how to use.  I think he was more excited than I was.  I started going to the gym, and drinking his banana, apple, pechay concoction for breakfast.

IMG_9924The trip to Hong Kong on the first of January was our chance to be together alone.  He and I were both so excited to be together. It was a beautiful time, and he told me that he felt so comfortable being with me.  It was like being married 10, 20 years.  We were so happy together, except for the last night when we had another of our little tiffs, and traveled home hardly talking to each other.   But make up we did, as usual.  As Rollie said, there is nothing that can stop this love we have.  Well, nothing except death, and what a thief it is!

The week before he died, Rollie and I had dinner at an Indian restaurant near his home. He had decided to become vegan once again, and it was the perfect place for that. He said he used to eat there before but was very lonely; it was after his wife had died.  But he perked up, saying this time it’s different, I have you with me. I was teasing him about all his past girlfriends, when he took my hand and said, “This I know, Monette, you’re my last great love, the one I will spend the rest of my life with.”  I didn’t realize then how prophetic those words were.

If there’s one thing Rollie complained about, it was my need to love and be loved.  He said I was too needy. He always told me to become self-sufficient, to be happy being me, by myself.  Yes, Rollie taught me I could be happy after the death of my beloved Mike. Now, I need to get on with life, and learn to be happy without Rollie beside me.  Circle of life.

And there are many things I am truly grateful for.  First and foremost are my three beautiful children: Bea, Cara and Niccolo.  I have my mom who loves me unconditionally, my beloved sister, my brothers, their families, Cathy who takes care of me and my family.  I have my friends, and my work family at TeamAsia.  I’ve loved and been loved by two wonderful men, Mike and Rollie.  But most of all, I have a faithful and loving God who never lets go of me, despite my many failings.

At the Sistine Chapel the day before I left Rome, I was blessed to have had the opportunity to go to confession with Fr. Valentine, a black priest who suddenly showed up just as the museum was about to close.   Despite more than a hundred tourists milling about, I felt at peace talking to him and telling him about my grieving heart.  I asked him for prayers to discern and accomplish what I had been sent here on earth to do.

10997911_10204831175513486_2097251670_oSomeone sent me these amazing flowers yesterday without a card.  I have no idea who they’re from, but am truly grateful to the kind soul out there who remembered me.  It was after all, a different twist to this special day of love.