Endurance lessons from water, air, leaves

"She described the reasons 'why I should go on living.'

"That my life was not for myself alone, but also for others around me, especially for those with whom I have a strong emotional relationship...in spite of growing old and infirm, I still had the ability to give something to others. This sense of being able to give and not just take, makes living worthwhile. When the mind and brain still function, one can contribute even a tiny bit for the benefit of those with whom one has a relationship of love and trust." - Sherwin Nuland quoting a letter from his friend Ruby Chatterjee

Before officially crossing over to the year of grace (so-called because one is undeserving of it but it is still being given, perhaps not just another 365 days, maybe more), I've been reading up on aging. The book beside my bed these past nights is Dr. Nuland's The Art of Aging: A Doctor's Prescription for Well-being (a Random House book published in '07).

The small discomforts of physical aging are not yet pronounced, although I'm starting to feel them. But I don't pay heed to them during walks with The Wee One. She isn't so wee anymore. A few days ago, she declared with surety one morning, while gazing up at me, that she wasn't that small anymore, that her head of soft curls could now reach my belly button area.

Our extended family of born free creatures now includes these fish that gotta swim and the wild birds (ravens?) that gotta fly, then rest on tree's branches before they zip to other parts of Baguio.

During those walks, she'd skip, hop, run, climb, ask to be pushed high when she's on the playground swing. I am just her onlooker-observer, someone to sometimes hold hands with. She always chooses the path to take for those walks and leads the way. A "must" stopover is the village pond. She speaks low to remind me that we have to tiptoe. Then she puts her pointer finger across her lips to mean we shouldn't use our normal conversation voices. Otherwise, the school of fish swimming close to the murky, bottle-green surface of the water will quickly dive below.

Her eyes and powers of observation are sharper than mine. At times she even directs me to the direction of the wind that's rippling the water's surface. She notices the reflection of trees and ferns, the unusual shapes made by the morning shadows cast by capiz lamps that hang from the branches of a pine tree.

The strange shapes formed on the water's surface by a summer breeze, trees "growing" on water, the shadows cast by the trees--these are the things The Wee One and I delight in during the summer of her fourth year in this world.

Her lesson isn't lost on this aging woman. To enjoy a sacred Sunday like today, one must stay close to the Present and not fret about tomorrow and the days after it.

I hope that with my companionship, I've also contributed something to her life.

A friend once described her thoughts when she became a grandparent: "It's a great feeling! We all didn't like the idea of growing old. But you can't be a grandma without getting old." Photos by Babeth

She always walks ahead

Because she is 56 years younger than me, she moves faster, is more impatient than I am for things to happen and is always turning her head of natural curls to check if I'm following her. That's Kai/Butones/The Wee One at three years old going on four in a few more days.

She maps out our walking route for the day and doesn't fail to remind me, "Bring your camera, Booboo." She also knows when she is tired, and it's time to head home for a glass of water and a snack. Once indoors, our activities change depending on her interest from moment to moment. Which makes it hard for me to concentrate on something like composing a blog about how our morning went after a light breakfast.

It's quiet. I think another family elder, her mother in all likelihood, told her to take a nap. Now for some composition-for-the-day time.


Waiting for Booboo to catch up

"Come, follow me."

Checking if her big shadow is within sight

Pauses...

...to say "You don't have to take my pictures all the time. Hmph!"

She climbs the bench from where we like to gaze at a fishpond.

She doesn't sit down, jumps down, then...

...takes a long look at the pond to check on the koi if they're swimming near the surface.

Those are the fish we address with a song we make up by yourselves. To the tune of anything we softly sing words like: "Hello, fish in the pond, we are here with you today. It's a Sunday. We hope you like our song. Don't be scared. We just want to say hello. Did you sleep well? Do you dream of the ocean or are you happy in your pond?"

The Wee One sings softly so as not to frighten the koi away.

Then it's pasikat (show-off) time. Runs and jumps from one low rock to another.

If she runs ahead of me, it's okay so long as it's not on any road.

Our kyootie patootie is human, too. She tires and has to Take Five.

She wants to take pictures now and then. She's actually skilled already as far as framing, like this one of her Booboo, is concerned. Spoken (or written) like a proud lola should.

She can evaluate her work and declare, "Hmmm, this one has too much light!" Naks!

She chooses the particular stair where she wants her picture taken before saying that the walk is finished.


Photos by Kai Fernandez and Babeth Lolarga

My physical parts

"The people we most love do become a physical part of us, ingrained in our synapses, in the pathways where memories are created." - Meghan O’Rourke

I can bonk my head with my fist on some days. I am so busy these days that I cannot even find my own buttocks sometimes. It's almost the end of the schoolyear so there are exams that must be administered, grades computed, evaluations composed apart from everyday writing deadlines. But I can't complain. I love doing all of the above that have to do with becoming a late bloomer of a teacher and an angst-filled writer.

To keep in touch my eldest kid Kimi sends me photos of her daughter, our Wee One. She has quickly grown out of toddler clothes and is turning into a full-grown child with her own smart-ass opinions and tyrannical ways. I wonder from what side of the family she gets it? Hmmmm...

While I was in recovery from assorted ailments and coping with deadlines in school and work, a little milestone occurred in The Wee One's life: Moving Up Day. Although I originally thought that her progressive little school didn't hand out academic honors, apparently it does. Kimi texted me Tuesday that her kid was handed out No. 3 honors in the Top Five of her nursery class.

Of course, the stage lolo can't help but sigh into my phone, "If she weren't so tardy or absent for many reasons, she would have been Number One."

Of course, the lola was furious! Her lines went: "For heaven's sake, Rolly! It's only nursery! Why are you pushing her so hard? Let her have some fun! Be happy that she's happy every time it's time to go to school!!!" And on and on she went until lolo had to say "Bye bye, see you when I see you." Why does the wife/mother/grandmother have to be right all the time? Told ya. That's where the kid got the bossy genes!


Proud Mamay and her daughter

Class of 2014-15, nursery level

Now it's called happy love mail

"I am guilty of pushing snail mail on you just about every other blog post. But you know how when you discover something really great, you want to tell everyone about it? That’s me with snail mail … since, like, 1996, when I figured out how to write...My hope is that if you currently have trouble thinking of reasons to write letters, you’ll be inspired to churn one out this weekend." -

I agree with Ms. Bugbee's view, and I'm also pushing snail mail in my blog apart from the Artists Trading Cards movement. Mine isn't a physically demonstrative family. Rolly, Kimi, Ida and I show a physical demonstration of love that overflows on The Wee One who is just learning how to write. Among ourselves (the four adults), we write, email and text.

While I was researching for an Inquirer article on the advantages of writing love letters in longhand, Rolly lent me the correspondence among family members and friends that he had safeguarded all these decades. Reading them brought long and vivid flashbacks to time spent on other parts of the archipelago and of the world. So I thank you, my Valentine of almost 31 years, our family's philatelist, for keeping these written records.

My first postcard to The Wee One mailed from Bohol where Rolly and I marked our 30th or pearl anniversary as a married couple.

The Tintin card I bought at the newly opened Tintin shop in Singapore's Chinatown in 2012. I used it as a get-well card to family members when the cold was circulating in the Baguio house. I can sound like a quack doctor during medical emergencies.

Poet Luisa A. Igloria thinking of what kind of old women she and I will be. We're almost there, Luisa!

Our dear daughter Kimi writes to her folks from Macau although they were travelling as a family here.

From Nanay to Tatay who write to one another even as they travel together

A father's contrite note to his daughters after he loses their list of what to buy for them as pasalubongin Hongkong

A postcard from our kumpare, Wilson Bailon, then Senate reporter of Manila Chronicle and who was invited by the US government to observe a presidential campaign in progress

From a man of scanty words to his wife and travel companion. The postcard with a photo by Tommy Hafalla was mailed from the town of Sagada, Mountain Province

Another postcard from Thailand from journalist Frank Cimatu, who's a diehard Noranian, to my daughter Kimi

The most precious item in Rolly Fernandez's collection: a postcard from then Foreign Affairs Secretary Carlos P. Romulo addressed to Rolly's then boss Neal H. Cruz. The card was lying around on the untidy common news desk, and Rolly as is his wont, "saved" it. Must be worth something in e-Bay.

Photos by Babeth Lolarga