A Letter To My Son (This Life’s Sweetest Gift)

 

In all honesty, I thought I was going to die while laboring in that maternity hospital twenty years ago. Braving pain has never been one of my virtues. I was told in my younger years that giving birth would have me screaming for mercy to all the saints up in heaven. Well, how right they were. Nothing could be further from the truth. But then, during those fateful moments when I was on the verge of bringing you out into this world, Life was also about to bestow upon me its sweetest gift.

I am certainly not a paragon of an outstanding mother. One of the chief purposes of this blog is for me to come clean about being just another average living soul who goes through life with no immunity to life mishaps and who keeps on committing monumental mistakes along the way. A broken soul with deep flaws who conceals emotional scars in order to move on gracefully. A single mother who’s got perpetual misgivings over her parental skills. Someone who has had shortcomings too disconcerting to disclose here.

I never had much chance to narrate my life stories to you. But I’m sure you already know me very well. We’ve been through a lot. There are no more indispensable secrets left to be told. You’re the only person I’ve allowed to see me crumble when confounded by job intricacies or business problems that threaten to annihilate our livelihood. There’s been more than a few occasions when you find me with nary an ounce of emotional strength to cut the Gordian Knot on pressing matters. Not to mention the agonizing affairs of the heart that has had your mother trudging in the dark. Oh how I wish there remain certain things I let unknown to my son.

Surprisingly, you’ve turned out to be a magnanimous person. Your unassuming manners, your ingenuous way in dealing with life, the way you handle crisis with better equanimity have all rendered me proud and in awe of you. People have told me they just couldn’t find a mean bone in your body. Time and again I get concerned by your innocent grasp of this literally mischievous world we live in, fearing you might get taken for a ride. With absolute certainty, I profess that you are a far better human being than I could ever be. What made me deserve this much felicity for having you as my child?

Your mother has not been the religious type for several years now yet you managed to find your way, cultivating and maintaining a healthier relationship with God far more than I have. You even told me half in jest long ago you had wanted to become a priest, which got me responding with apprehension “No no.. You’ve got to get married and give me grandchildren! I desperately look forward to seeing my grandchildren with you.”

A husband I can do without. You already discerned that about your mom. You also never had a real father figure as you were growing up. It has been only you and me all these years, without another male figure majorly factoring in our lives. I am happy you seem to have turned out fine. Very much fine in fact. You’ve also heard people keep on asking me ‘why not give marriage another chance?’ There had been times when I asked myself ‘why couldn’t things be just ideally right? Is it them or is it me really?’ The answer doesn’t matter anymore. A flagrant truth that took some time for me to face, I am not wife material after all. Taking into account my highly sensitive nature as well, tending to and loving a man who ends up not meeting the crucial touchstones just isn’t worth it. I find myself repeatedly on the losing side. Relationships entail hard work. It’s something I’d rather not devote my energy and heart to given the not so abundant time I have left. Please do not think though your mom has lost faith in the beauty of earnest love or relationships.

I guess you’d want to see me happy in love again. Through the years, you’ve witnessed my ups and downs in the name of romantic love. Romantic love is beautiful. Quite true. I want you to have that for good with the right girl someday. I’ve a feeling you’ll do far better in this department than I did because of your much more beautiful character. You simply deserve to garner the highest splendors of life.

You might not know this but I had wanted to give motherhood another chance long before reaching my 40^th birthday some years ago. I seriously considered the notion of having another child for the more important reason of giving you a brother or a sister. I worry that you’ll be alone when I’m gone. After serious consideration though, it dawned on me that that would mean complications to both our lives. You would have to help me look after your younger sibling who’s got a different father. Not a good idea. I couldn’t imagine putting you through such a circumstance. Besides, I wouldn’t want us to lose our prospects to take things a lot easier in our futures to come. No need to deny that. And you seem to be alright with the setup “it’s just you and me, kid’ I’m relieved.

Sometimes I wonder how we’ve reached this far and how things miraculously turned out okay for the two of us. We’ve made it through somehow. God has been really good.

Do you know the very best part of my day? Hearing your key unlock the door and seeing you quietly entering the house as I welcome you into my arms, thankful you’ve come home to me safe and sound.

Though our constant togetherness exasperates both of us at times, we’ve acted more like a team. On the whole, our simple life has engendered a certain kind of equilibrium that I hope has worked to your advantage too.

Our relationship is far from tumultuous although not without critical imperfections. I had wanted you to be different from your father and me. What a huge blunder on my part. Please let me explain.. Stuff that metaphorically crippled your parents for life is something I hadn’t wanted to pass on to you. The reason which could only be my desire to see you living a life a hundred times better than the one I have had. Conflicts ensued between us as a consequence. A weak cause and battle I must have lost even from the very start. It goes without saying there are things inherent in life that can never be altered.

The times when I felt your pain because I had hurt your feelings, I still remember. You shed tears you couldn’t hold back anymore. You love me that much I know. Let me ask for your forgiveness this time for all the anguish I had brought you. What you may not know is your pain caused me the harshest of heartaches too, for I’ve no desire whatsoever to lodge any disharmony between us. I wish I could go back in time to reverse my offenses and undo the hurt.

A long stretch of the future is still ahead for you. Many things are bound to happen in your tomorrows. One hard lesson we’ve got to carve in our minds and souls – there can be no sure thing on this planet. Everything is destined to evolve. Even our strong bond can be headed for a surprising transformation in years to come. Nothing is certain. It isn’t much different from the oversight of not choosing a better father for you. I honestly thought at that time ‘what could immensely go wrong?’

Such a fool was I then for not knowing any better.

But for now, I’m fully blessed to have you as the main person in my life. My emotional fulcrum.. and the truest love of my whole existence. Life without you is just unimaginable.

The stars will burn bright for up to millions of years, but no words can ever measure up to how much I want to hold you dear to my heart. And if there’s such a thing as forever, your presence is all I need to see me through.

Thank you for bearing with me.. Thank you for the joy of being your mom.

Thank you so much for the love you have given me.

 

The Father of My Son

This one I’ve been meaning to write for a long time for the benefit of my son who never knew much about his father. It’s been more than 10 years since we last saw him. I believe I owe my son this post. He’s 20 now and perhaps, if he’d come across this piece in the near future, he’d already have acquired more awareness to discern some of life’s complexities and thus be able to understand more or less what happened in our past.

My son and I never talked much about the man who was once a huge part of our lives. Vague and hazy memories are all he’s got. We reckon we’ve got more important things to do than talk about the man who extricated himself and took the easy way out by totally disappearing in our lives. Nonetheless, I believe he deserves to know some things about his Dad, and our history together as a couple.         

There have been more than fine memories I still keep of the one I married and loved for ten years. We met at work when I was still hacking it out in the accounting field of the international firm Data General Philippines. Quiet and reserved like me. Practical minded. Unassuming. Passionate and sweet. That’s my ex-husband, whose personality isn’t different from the shrinking violet that I am. And somewhere between our 20s and silly eccentricities, we fell in love. Once upon a time.

Apart from him, I’ve never been loved as much by any other man or received as much romantic ardor and affection. I remember the heady days when he’d call to ask me to meet him up so we could simply take a stroll around the neighborhood hand in hand.

He could cook and was the one who whipped up various dishes for our meals (I never liked cooking by the way), and he took care of me at certain times when I got sick.

I also remember during a particular lean time in our finances when we met out of the blue one morning outside my parent’s house. I told him I hadn’t eaten breakfast yet so I was feeling hungry. He proceeded to search for the last remaining coins inside his pockets to buy me pieces of bread that I could munch on from a nearby store. I believe the bread got tastier then because of that particular display of caring he had shown me.

We’d also hang around inside the mall until late at night when the movie clerks stationed outside would finally go home and we’d run and sneak inside the movie house, giggling all the way, to watch the movie for free.

Certainly a few memories I’ve treasured of our simple fun and sweetness as a twosome.

Every weekend, we would meet in his sister’s rest house located in a peaceful suburban village and spend the whole day basking in the glow of our love for each other.

Good times, good times..                  

Months of passionate trysts on end went by until one day I mysteriously got sick. It was aggregated by a high fever for a couple of days, some vomiting and just feeling terrible.

My sister asked me pointblank, “Are you pregnant?”

“Of course not!” was my quick and bewildered reply.  Honestly, that probability never entered my mind but I soon rushed to him and together we proceeded to the nearest maternity hospital for some test.

Result: Positive. OMG..

We had been careful and did our best to follow the calendar method. How could it have happened?  

We weren’t ready for anything like parenthood and responsibility yet. We weren’t even sure we were truly the Right Ones for each other.

In the end, we decided to have the baby and got married in a civil ceremony. The officer who performed the rites joked about my ex-husband’s cold hands after shaking hands with him. Only his brother and aunt had been present to serve as witnesses. Oh by the way, he belonged to another religion.

Looking back, difference in religion could have factored considerably in the demise of our marriage. I am a Catholic, though not a practicing one. His family had been generations-long members of the second most powerful religion in our country that has been considered quite clannish and tribal by many. They have repeatedly asked me to join their Church. All I managed to do was attend and sit out at some worship services and that was it. I guess you all know by now, I can’t possibly bring myself to do or join anything that doesn’t feel natural for me.

In the course of time, he managed to make one thing quite clear. His mother and siblings would always come first. My son and I could only come second. He reasoned they needed him more. I guess he inferred his immediate family was more of a sure thing in his twilight years than my son and I combined. He could have also realized I was capable of bringing up our child on my own after all. That fact apparently granted him the audacity to pursue his own goals that don’t include my son and me.

He worked in the Middle East intermittently as a contractual electrical engineer. But everything he earned went to his family, that is, his mom and siblings. I’ve always been capable of earning my own money so I didn’t ask for his share, though I got increasingly frustrated that he didn’t make any attempt to pitch in. How come there was no way for me to detect these ominous elements earlier in our relationship?

As time went by, our stark differences took a more profound shape as well. It’s like we each belonged to disparate worlds. Our dissimilarities in choice of leisure activities became more pronounced. He branded my tastes in TV programs, movies, reading and music as being uppity and was never able to relate much to the literary leanings I had had.

I guess he had wanted me to share in the glee with the things that gave him amusement. I tried but couldn’t be genuinely upbeat doing it. A huge stone of discontent had come to lodge in our relationship as it slowly dawned on both of us how different our preferences were in many ways.

There could have been recognition too on his part that I’m not that much of a wife material, the kind that he needed in his life. Perhaps I might have been the wife that made sense only on paper but not from day to day in its domestic essence.

To his credit, he had been faithful in the years we were together as husband and wife. I never had to confront with the perils of infidelity or grappled with a skirt-chasing husband during our union.

Before our marriage completely came unglued, we got to see less and less of him until he drifted away for good. There was not even a final farewell from him.

That was a little more than ten years ago, when my son was barely 10 years old.

My son’s idiosyncrasies and occasional flash of outburst now is sometimes reminiscent of the man I once loved. Whenever that happens, I can’t help but go “Oh, it’s his father alright” in my mind. A father’s blood will run eternally in his child’s veins.

This is my side of the story. My ex-husband’s side will never come to light because I have a feeling we’ll never see him again. Whatever reasons he might have had for his unconscionable deed of turning his back on his son carry no weight upon me anymore. Besides, we’ve fared just fine.

 Maybe he’s in a very far away land now or, for all I know, he may already be in another dimension… There’s a chance I will never get to know for sure and frankly, I’m fine with that.

And so is my son it seems.

 

Valentine Season Ponderings of Single Women Like Me

I hate to put out another sappy piece here but Valentine’s Day is coming around the corner and that gives me fair enough reason to write about love and men-my most favorite topics- once more. Yipee.

Please take note that I’m still resolute in granting my weary heart a sabbatical, which means I’ve no plan to put it on the line yet. Be that as it may, I find no reasons not to be happy. Life has been good recently and it still is.

To be honest, I’m not totally loveless on this special day. Aside from my son, there’s one in particular who’s gonna be so happy to see me and spend time with me. My cat. As soon as I get home from work, she’ll start following me around, making unintelligible sounds equivalent to saying she missed me the whole day, and then proceed to show me her undying devotion in her own feline ways. For sure, we’ll be having dinner together sharing a can of sardines afterwards. No kidding. Hey, it’s not that bad. I do love my cat. And some sardines can be tasty and delicious.

You know I put up this blog so I could start to chronicle my life’s narrative. The question is, am I ready to narrate to my dear readers my love stories of epic dimensions? (ho-ho, I’m exaggerating, of course) Nah. Maybe not yet. In the near future perhaps. But here’s the deal. Whatever you’ll learn about me and my past romantic misdemeanors, just promise you won’t report me to the nearest Police Love Station. Ok?

There’s one thing you should know about our race. We are widely known for indulging in the extravagance of our feelings and emotions. Crimes of passion are not extraordinary occurrences here. Only in this land can you hear of mortals actually willing to die for love, or surrender in all foolishness in the name of unmitigated, relentless ardor. How we revel in its sensations, never lacking in PDAs or ingenious ways to demonstrate our supposed infinite (?) affection for each other.  I have to admit that we sometimes find western movies on love lacking in dramatic embellishments. They’re a little flat and laid-back, in our honest opinion (sorry..). Our romantic films in comparison are intense, high-strung, oftentimes tempestuous, laced with intricate angles that twist and turn. That’s how we normally favor all things romantical here.

Freddie Mercury of Queen sang about this crazy little thing called love, remember?   

And there are times too when I liken this whole notion of love to an inconceivable dream. You try to reach for the stars and in certain magical moments, you feel as though they’re already within your grasp. Just as you’re about to touch one, you plummet back to earth and crash down explosively in unfathomable fashion. It’s as if we aren’t meant to mingle with the brightest in heavens, after all..

Alright, alright.. Before I lower the curtains on this entry, I’ll confess to keeping someone somewhere in the outskirts of my heart for this particular Valentine. Not so much on the romantic sphere though. But I consider this person special to me because he inspires me in a good sense with his gracious manners, erudite mind, elegant writing style and flawless grammar. Don’t dare ask me who he is or I’ll turn tail and flee. Comprende?

Happy Valentine Season, dear readers!