25 years gone but unforgotten

Yesterday was our Dad's 25th death anniversary. I stayed away from this space on that occasion, thinking that I might just get all weepy, senti and emo while recalling him. But at past 4 a.m. today while I write this, I am stone cold sober. Twenty and five years may have passed since he left for eternity, but I carry this man's image intact in my heart. These days whenever I find myself in a fix, the question I immediately ask myself is, "What would Dad (and now Mom who has joined him) do?" Lemme tell you, they combine forces to aid me in my struggle, no matter how minute or insignificant to the world. And when I'm sick, I call on Dad, too, and somehow I surmount the situation. So thanks, Dad. I know we will be together. In the meantime, I've still got a lotta livin' to do.

Staying hungry and foolish for life

The title of today's blog is inspired by a RebelleSociety.com article, written by Shavawn M. Berry, on taking a fool's leap into the world.

Leaps of faith have been what my late teacher Nieves B. Epistola called the "style markers" of my life. Especially as far as a checkered employment career is concerned. Especially as I am about to arrive at the big six zero that will give me certain privileges as a senior citizen, but I never know what will happen within the span of a day, no matter how well laid out my plans are.

It's really up to some divine source and my own determination to begin something (whether an article, a poem, a painting, volunteer work) and end it either with a flourish, a deafening slam of the door or a gentle tap of a computer key. This progressive learning of how to live from moment to moment lets me stay hungry (not entirely the physical pangs of hunger) and stay foolish. The fool is me, the one who even in almost late adulthood chooses to look at the world like a child.

One time a former editor told me how the longest service record she ever had in a publication was five years. Another former boss, also with a journalism background, said media life is one of musical chairs. But it was the tone with which they said what they said that grabbed me. There was no tinge of regret.

And so is the living of my life...on a wing and a prayer but with dignified desperation because I know that at the end of it, at the closing of a chapter, perhaps, perhaps and maybe I shall be rewarded with the face of He/She I call my God.

Meanwhile, let me close this latest outburst of kinder angst with some lines of a poem shared by a friend this morning. He said this Seamus Heaney poem was voted in Ireland as the best-loved poem written in the past 100 years, It's about a quiet moment when he and his mother peeled potatoes: "I remember her head bent towards my head, / Her breath in mine, our fluent dipping knives -- / Never closer the whole rest of our lives."

I am suddenly missing my lola who helped make my young happy Baguio memories possible, Dad whose silence was always "more than words", Mrs. Epistola who showed both her cerebral and emotional sides when there was just the two of us. They're gone from this world, but Mom is still around although I'm far away from her now. She has always been that pillar of strength made of the finest steel in our family. I wish her more years.

Self-portraits with enlarging shadows. Shot in Baguio, 2014.

My Twitter pal from Greece

If you look close enough, there's some kind of watermark on the upper left side that gives the name of the photographer. Anna Papadopoulou sent me this via Twitter last night after I thanked her for her tweets, mainly images like this one, that I find solace in after a day's work. Twitter, like many popular social media platforms, can be noisy and busy. Once in awhile, I happen upon something as soothing as a girl in pink.

And this served as my thank-you "note" to Anna P of Corfu, Greece. Someday we will meet, and I hope it'll be in a Grecian isle. These pink, orange and yellow flowers grow abundantly in what once was my Dad's garden, now tended by Mom and my bro Dennis. Photo by Babeth Lolarga

September morning of our lives

Another holiday, this time because it's Baguio Day. You can imagine how skippy happy The Wee One is with another full day ahead of her, all her own. Photo by Babeth Lolarga

Here's a song that I hope she also grows into. I'm teaching her the spiritual "He's Got the Whole World in His Hands" and "Somewhere Over the Rainbow", and she enjoys watching on YouTube the Mormon Tabernacle Choir's versions.

Maybe when she's a little bigger. My Dad used to sing this when it was being played on the radio as he drove his car. Neil Diamond's "September Morn" remains one of the songs that I associate with him.

Some excerpts:

Stay for just a while
Stay and let me look at you
It's been so long, I hardly knew you
Standing in the door

Stay with me a while
I only wanna talk to you
We've traveled halfway 'round the world
To find ourselves again

September morn
We danced until the night
Became a brand new day
Two lovers playing scenes
From some romantic play
September morning
Still can make me feel that way

Look at what you've done
Why, you've become a grown-up girl
I still can hear you crying
In a corner of your room
And look how far we've come
So far from where we used to be
But not so far that we've forgotten
How it was before...