Lifesavers

The note came at the exact moment when I needed it most.

I had just finished interviewing a source and before that a series of unfortunate events had been piling up that were trying my psyche. I happened to be on the 22nd level balcony of the source's office. We had a more than pleasant conversation; the source was frank, open, genial. Once my responsibility was over, I stepped out the balcony overlooking Manila Bay to have some quiet time.

And then IT came again--the urge to meld with the elements, with the setting sun, with the late afternoon breeze. All I had to do was lean low over the ledge, and that would have done it. Something held me back, a tiny voice that said, "All shall be well. Have patience. Give life a chance."

I heeded it, went back inside the source's office and bid the people present, including a secretary and a marketing person, a polite goodbye.

When I got home, I lay down for some minutes on my bed without removing the covers, rested, allowed my nausea for life to subside a bit, showered (that always helps, a cold shower!) and returned to my "home office". I checked my email and the first item I noted in the inbox was this note attached to an email sent by F. Sionil Jose. He used to be "Frankie" to me until he turned 90 and I had to switch to "Manong."

His note (or what I could make out of his penmanship) read:

"My dear Babeth, I just got Hermie's PEN Journal and I have just finished your personal essay Roots/Flight. It's beautiful, evocative, profound and sincere--poetic in parts and so spiritually revealing of the Babeth who goes around in baduy dress. You are a brilliant writer, Babeth. Of course, I've known this from way back but all the virtues are now coming out in middle age! It's both roots and flight and there's no contradiction here. It's in our being human, but we sleep in the knowledge until we wake up as artists! Manong Frankie"

I broke down in hot tears. I will never doubt again that there is a Force, an unseen Source that steadies the wobbly. It isn't Manong Frankie. It's something greater!

Elmer Ordoñez: From the First Quarter Storm to Facebook

Elmer Ordoñez: From the First Quarter Storm to Facebook

Elmer's feast

The cover of Elmer A. Ordoñez's Snows of Yesteryear: A Family in War and a Sentimental Education, an "autobiography disguised as a novel."

The last day of January 2015 was a double book launch day in different parts of sprawling Metro Manila. There is no longer a sleepy hour in terms of road traffic on EDSA. There was the fiction anthology Fast Food Delivery at Greenbelt 4 Makati City at 3 p.m., then Snows of Yesteryear at Solidaridad Bookshop in Ermita at 5 p.m. By 12 noon in Sison, Pangasinan, where the Victory Bus I was riding in en route to Cubao from Baguio City made a 15-minute pit stop, I decided I'd just head straight to Dr. Ordoñez's launch and buy my copy of Anvil's FFD another day.

I had only one body, which was still in recovery from surgery, and I could only manage an event at a time. It was a wise decision, considering I had my backpack on my back, a walking cane on my left hand, a bag of 40 pieces of brownies and two Mario Parial paintings that my husband Rolly had carefully packed in preparation for a Parial retrospective where they would be included. Eeek! Bag lady forever!

But the gods and goddesses of literary Olympus looked kindly on this traveler. I entered Solidaridad past six and climbed its two flights of stairs to catch Dr. Ordoñez fielding the last two questions from the audience concerning his latest book.

I make it a point to be at friends' book launches. I know the difficulties writers go through in order to write, to support writing, to finish a manuscript and to find a publisher. When others try to inveigle me to be involved in so-called "book projects" with an eye on a launch day, I pull back, decline politely (on rare times, impolitely, if the "client" is over-demanding). A book is a work of love; one's life, one's strife, one's passions and convictions are in it. It cheapens the writer if demands on meeting strict deadlines so a book party can fall on a propitious date are made.

I'm glad for the cool, laidback Prof. Ordoñez. He finished his manuscript, then saw it in printed form after turning a young 85 in December. The good news is he has another book in the back burner. I say, "Bring it on" and "More power to prolific octogenarians!" Thanks for setting such a fine example, sir.

P.S. Puwede bang bumati? Mila D. Aguilar, thank you for seeing me to my door. I love a writing community, especially one that looks out for the members' health and safety.

The author whose book's title comes from French poet François Villon's line "Where are the snows of yesteryear?" In Dr. Ordoñez's case, he refers not only to "those wintry times in foreign climes, but on a life--from early years in Manila and Pasay, the war years, and my intellectual formation through adulthood, marked singularly by struggle for a just, democratic and sovereign country..." Photos by Babeth Lolarga

That's my kumpare Amadis Ma. Guerrero on the right, I suppose doing a shotgun interview of the book author.

Happy also to see another former colleague, friend and lover of letters Alejandrino "Al" Vicente who's also in the midst of writing a collection of short fiction (or is it a novel?).

National Artist for Literature F. Sionil Jose and wife and muse Tessie also have reason to celebrate because their bookshop turns 50 years old in June this year.

The author's political color is evident in his guests who turned up last night: Ka Bobbie Malay and her mahal, Ka Satur Ocampo.

I get my chance to pose with the man who wrote a generous intro to my third poetry book, Big Mama Sez: Poems Old & New. Thanks for this memento, Geraldine C. Maayo, a devoted student of Doc Ordoñez.

Doc signing my copy

Not a wallflower at a party

Or so I think. I just couldn't forgive myself if I missed a milestone like F. Sionil Jose's 90th birthday party. Occasions like that are about the only time I see, press palms with or buss my writing mentors, idols and confreres. A friend said that in her excitement, she hyperventilated that night and forgot to have her picture taken with friends she hadn't seen in a long time.

While I was recuperating in Baguio from an ailment I would rather not discuss at length and my husband was forced to stay home and stay still because of a knee fracture, we went on a reading marathon of Manong Frankie's short stories and novels. It reached a point where we'd try to discuss what we had read and ended up mixing the characters and plots. Rolly counted how many times Frankie used the word "sybarite" in a novel. That sounds like my husband all right. You can keep the editor at home but not the editor from NOT working.

Thank you to the people who pressed the button of my camera so I can have a few mementos of the evening of Dec. 3 at the Cultural Center's main lobby.

Alfredo Roces, who I've been reading since high school, the birthday boy and fictionist Rony Diaz

It was Manong Frankie who told my class of high school kids: "You must not forgive a writer his sins just because he's a good writer." He's shown with a reader who's glad to have a few seconds with him before he was deluged with more well-wishers.

With Tessie Jose, who continues to make Frankie's life of letters possible, and sculptor Julie Lluch. Manang Tessie has kept her figure. This was the same outfit she wore when Frankie turned 80.

The heavyweights' table, only because two other National Artists for Literature are sharing space: Bienvenido Lumbera and Cirilo Bautista. The writers' wives are by their side, too: Shayne Lumbera and Rose Bautista.

Ka Satur Ocampo and Ka Universe Gilda Cordero Fernando

Three muses of literature Susan Lara, Marj Evasco and Gilda

Two publishing greats: Eugenia "Eggie" Apostol and Gilda yet again

Celeste Legaspi sings "Gaano Kita Kamahal" for the birthday celebrator (he with the black beret)

Blurry though it may seem this precious photo of laughing writing couple Roger and Fe Mangahas is full of meaning to me: love conquers all, especially dictatorships, aging and personal tragedies.

The untouched birthday cake that features likenesses of the covers of Frankie's novels. The cake people flocked to was the one baked by Estrel's, specializing in caramel cakes. It was given by the University of Santo Tomas's The Varsitarian which Frankie edited in his youth.

Throwback Thursday: Darling Mrs. E (and her SV)

Iconic: Nieves Benito Epistola and SV Espitola, professors who professed at the University of the Philippines and in the university of good living Photo from the UP Alumni Relations Archives

The following were remarks that I had read at the eulogy for Mrs. E in September 2002 at the Delaney Hall of the UP Chapel of the Holy Sacrifice.

It is Mrs. E's birthday today.

~~~~~~

My Mrs. E

"Your UP education won't be complete unless you sign up in one of of Mrs. Epistola's classes." This was the advice my older first cousin, Henry Romero, gave when I was a college freshman. He had been Mrs. E's student in a GE subject.

There was a special light in his eyes when he talked about her. My curiosity grew when he told me that she loved the poems of e.e. cummings.

I heeded his suggestion and took Stylistics in 1975 as an elective under her. She was 49 years old then. I am 47 now. But at that time hers was a waistline to die for!

She dressed in what's called today as "smart casual," and when the occasion called for it, she could also be elegant in an Oleg Cassini frock. She cut a statuesque figure in front of the class. She walked briskly on and off campus, arms swinging freely. And she spoke in a distinctively resonant alto.

I could write a poem about her dimples along, how they danced and deepened when she was pleased with something, someone or some cat that brushed past her long, marble-white legs.

The following semester I just couldn't have enough of her so I audited her next Stylistics class. That was around the time she became more than a teacher. I found a patient friend with a gift of listening to my incoherent babblings.

Way before I had a boyfriend, before anyone was crazy enough to propose marriage to me, I had already asked her to be my ninang sa kasal. She said yes, even if she knew there was no guy in my life. In that sense, we were both optimists.

I once told Amadis Ma. Guerrero, my colleague and comrade in arts and letters, that Nieves and SV Epistola were the only couple who I considered an argument for the institution of marriage.

Amadis agreed, adding that Mrs. E was the perfect foil for SV, the great alaskador. SV would mask his affection for friends with a string of barbs and put-downs. With Mrs. E, there was no such mask.

Amadis, who she called Le Cheri Guerrier, and I benefited from her overflowing warmth and generosity. She wrote the introductions to our respective books. Speaking for myself, I honestly believe that her introduction outshone my 38 poems!

Mrs. E loved people. This love was returned in full measure, especially by her students, former students and the members of that lucky circle, her proteges.

Of her proteges, including those who aren't here like Lily Chua O'Connor and Gigi Dueñas de Beaupre, Mrs. E said last year, with Frankie and Tessie Jose as witnesses in her room at the Philippine General Hospital: "I made free spirits out of them!"

Unmindful of the intravenous drip attached to her, she declared this with her head proudly tilted back, her chin up.

Yes, she was generous with her time and material resources. She never gave things away piecemeal. I remember she gave me not just a bundle of cherries but a big big bag of moist, succulent cherries.

Last Christmas, she gave me not just a pair of earring but 10 pairs of dangling earrings. I would like to assure her surviving sisters, nieces and grand-nieces that those earrings are fancy and won't get anything at the nearest pawnshop.

More than the earrings, I treasure the note that came with it. She wrote: "Here's a Christmas pamana for you, Babeth. You can't imagine ever how much you've made me feel so blessed and full of grace."

Well, Mrs. E, the feeling is mutual.

She always signed these little notes with a smiley face after her initials. Those notes were poems in themselves. Language, after all, was her favorite tool and toy.

I still keep in an old diary another note from her that she wrote when my hair was longer, and I just had it curled. Her message ran: "Now that your hair is a folded flower, the quiet of peace is in your feet."

She did everything well. She cooked well, taught extremely well, praised well, even criticized well. She dissected one of my early short stories, found it wanting and told me point by point how I could revise it. (Note: The short story was published 10 years after she had written her marginal notes and I had found the time to revise it. It was published in two installments in the Weekly Mirror Magazine when Emmie Velarde was its editor and Nick Joaquin, its literary editor.)

Ang sarap-sarap talaga magmahal ni Mrs. E!

And I truly feel the loss of SV, Odette, Arline, the rest of the sisters, Citas Diaz and other in-laws, nieces and nephews on both the Benito and Epistola sides. Your loss equals ours, if that is consolation enough.

To quote from Shakespeare, "Whence comes another?"

Not in this lifetime!

Them rules of the reds and of the blues dat reign in mah life

In an email from a beloved jazz singer who also sings the blues, she gave these guidelines on how to deal with 'em blues (she sourced it from another lover of the blues):

Rules of the Blues

1) Most Blues begin, "Woke up this morning..." 

2) "I got a good woman" is a bad way to begin the Blues lest you stick something nasty in the next line like,  "I got a good woman, with the meanest face in town."

3) The Blues is simple. After you get the first line right, repeat it. Then find something that rhymes . Sort of: "Got a good woman with the meanest face in town. Yes, I got a good woman with the meanest face in town. Got teeth like Margaret Thatcher, and she weighs 500 pounds."

4) The Blues is not about choice. You stuck in a ditch, you stuck in a ditch-ain't no way out.

5) Blues cars: Chevys, Fords, Cadillacs and broken-down trucks. Blues don't travel in Volvos, BMWs, or Sport Utility Vehicles. Most Blues transportation is a Greyhound bus or a southbound train. Jet aircraft and state-sponsored motor pools ain't even in the running. Walkin' plays a major part in the blues lifestyle. So does fixin' to die.

6) Teenagers can't sing the Blues. Well, except maybe Johnny Lang. Adults sing the Blues. In Blues "adulthood" means being old enough to get the electric chair if you shoot a man in Memphis.

7) Blues can take place in New York City but not in Hawaii or anyplace in Canada. Hard times in Minneapolis or Seattle are probably just clinical depression. Chicago, St. Louis, and Kansas City are still the best places to have the Blues. You cannot have the blues in any places that don’t get rain.

8) A man with male pattern baldness ain't the blues. A woman with male pattern baldness is. Breakin your leg cause you went skiing is not the blues. Breakin your leg 'cause a alligator be chompin on it is.

9) You can't have no Blues in an office or a shopping mall. The lighting is wrong. Go outside to the parking lot or sit by the dumpster.

10) Good places for the Blues: 

a) Highway; 

b) Jailhouse; 

c) Empty bed; 

d) Bottom of a whiskey glass. 

Bad places for the Blues: 

a) Dillard's; 

b) Gallery openings; 

c) Ivy League institutions; 

d) Golf courses.

11) No one will believe it's the Blues if you wear a suit, 'less you happen to be a old ethnic person, and you slept in it.

12) Do you have the right to sing the Blues? Yes, if 

a) You older than dirt; 

b) You blind; 

c) You shot a man in Memphis; 

d) You can't be satisfied.

No, if 

a) You have all your teeth; 

b) You were once blind but now can see; 

c) The man in Memphis lived; 

d) You have a 401K or trust fund.

13) Blues is not a matter of color. It's a matter of bad luck. Tiger Woods cannot sing the blues. Sonny Liston could. Ugly white people also got a leg up on the blues.

14) If you ask for water and your darlin' give you gasoline, it's the Blues.

Other acceptable Blues beverages are: 

a) Cheap wine; 

b) Whiskey or bourbon; 

c) Muddy water; 

d) Nasty black coffee.

The following are NOT Blues beverages: 

a) Perrier; 

b) Chardonnay; 

c) Snapple; 

d) Slim Fast.

15) If death occurs in a cheap motel or a shotgun shack, it's a Blues death.

Stabbed in the back by a jealous lover is another Blues way to die. So are the electric chair, substance abuse and dying lonely on a broken down cot. You can't have a Blues death if you die during a tennis match or getting liposuction.

16) Some Blues names for women: 

a) Sadie; 

b) Big Mama; 

c) Bessie; 

d) Fat River Dumpling

17) Some Blues names for men 

a) Joe; 

b) Willie; 

c) Little Willie; 

d) Big Willie

18) Persons with names like Michelle, Amber, Debbie, and Heather can't sing the Blues no matter how many men they shoot in Memphis.

19) Make your own Blues name Starter Kit:

a) Name of physical infirmity (Blind, Cripple, Lame, etc.);

b) First name (see above) plus name of fruit (Lemon, Lime, Kiwi, etc.);

c) Last name of President (Jefferson, Johnson, Fillmore, etc.);

d) For example, Blind Lime Jefferson, Jakeleg Lemon Johnson or Cripple Kiwi Fillmore, etc. (Well, maybe not "Kiwi.")

20) I don’t care how tragic your life is, if you own a computer, you can’t sing the blues.

The Rules of the Reds    

The blogger cannot rewrite nor "plagiarize" The Rules of the Blues, no matter how she makes a brave attempt to be at her wittiest. Still I'll see what I can do with the photos I took along with anonymous waiters and my spouse of 29 years.

Two retired professors, Geraldine Maayo of the UP School of Labor and Industrial Relations, and Rolly Fernandez of UP Baguio's College of Arts and Communication

A bluesy gal like the blogger, whose secret alias (no longer secret after this blog entry) is Big Mama, has got to pull down a lifeline like a white (as in fair-complexioned) spouse in the person of Rolly Fernandez. He came down from Baguio to join us that day. He's the one who works hard at the best thing he does (journalism) so he, with a little help from me, with my long-lost, newly found friend Geraldine Maayo, can host a "gratitude lunch" for the old guys of literature, F. Sionil Jose and Elmer Ordoñez.

Doc O and Manong Frankie get started with the spinach soup (or was it asparagus? Forgive the temporary forgetfulness). Frankie the gourmet recommends a small splash of Iluko vinegar in it and it opens up the flavor.

Geraldine and I are  especially grateful to Frankie for encouraging us when we were, in Hermie Beltran's words when we sat together at the faculty center forum at UP Diliman in the '70s, "fetus writers". Why so? Because grand dame of letters Carmen Guerrero Nakpil then referred to the already graying fictionist Greg Brilliantes as "young." I turned to Hermie to ask, "So what does that make of us?" Already quick-witted, he answered, "Fetus writers!"

Back to the lunch that took some time in coordinating to accommodate the schedules of three busy old men, including mine. Assembly area was Solidaridad Bookshop in Ermita which Rolly found perfect because he was looking for certain book titles, the bibliomaniac (more intense than bibliophile) in him in high gear again. Despite Doc O living in Cavite and F in one of the projects in Quezon City, they were the first to arrive followed by me, who taxied from Pasig and cursed the slow Pedro Gil traffic from Santa Ana to Paco, G, who commuted from Visayas ave., QC, and finally, R, still encased in a fleece jacket from Baguio.

After the re-acquaintance chit-chat, F asked the young 'uns (G, R and me) to pick from a pile of books at a corner of his office, new titles on reading and writing from some American publishers. Predictably, R picked a book on grammar and usage that F didn't sign while he wrote a nice dedication on my copy of The Writer's World: Essays edited by Lynne Gaetz and Suneeti Phadke.

Clockwise: Doc O, Frankie, Babeth, Geraldine and Rolly

Second group photo known as a security shot (from left): Doc O, Geraldine, Frankie, Babeth who seems to be growing out of Rolly's shoulder

We let Frankie choose the restaurant ; Doc O's only request was nothing spicy. So that did it for F's favorite Indian resto. We ended up at a Chinese place that serves, by F's judgment, the best Hainanese chicken in town.

Elmer Ordoñez, another former Philippine Collegian

We thought that the mealtime conversation would float in a rarefied stratosphere, but trust two Upsilonian fraternity brods (Doc O and R) to turn our lunch into one...I can't even find the precise word for it. Okay, the oral "hagiography" of their frat. 

R likes to say, in private conversations with me, that his is the ONLY fraternity and organization at the UP. "It's Upsilon and others," he'd declare firmly in the (outdated) machismo that frat is notorious for. I was partly shocked when Doc O of the finer sensibilities introduced another term during lunch: "Upsilon and other sororities." To mean the other frats and orgs are sissies.

Buddha-like National Artist for Literature F. Sionil Jose

And while this went on, F at one point looked at these frat brods slack-jawed while I, as usual, rolled my eyes heavenwards. At one point I cut in to ask if sartorial elegance was also inculcated among its members. To his credit, poker-faced Doc O formulated his reply this way: "When an Upsilonian wears a pair of khaki pants, di lang basta khaki. It has to be Dockers." Oo na nga!

We parted with an unexpressed wish that fun lunches like this one would happen again in the future so we could enjoy the company of F and Doc O while they are still very much around. 

My youngest daughter Ida, who, when she was in college, studied some short stories of F, was shocked at the launch of Mario Miclat's novel a few years back. She overheard me address F as"Frankie" without so much as an honorific "Manong." I explained to her that he didn't ask it of me when I met him when I was a gangling teen of 18 or 19, nor did he expect a "Sir" either. It had always been "Frankie" the way her Lolo SV Epistola was always "SV."

From Ermita, R and I taxied together to catch the general Paulinian homecoming at the Gilmore campus in QC. Who'd have thought that I'd live long enough to be part of our high school batch's ruby jubilee?  There I met up with younger sis Embeng who was in the company of her batchmates.

Babeth of Class of '73 with Class of '74's Embeng Lolarga, Rachel Reyes and Benzie de la Fuente

An honorary Paulinian in the middle? It's possible because St. Paul College is now a university and admits boys and men. It was Rachel's first time to attend a St. Paul QC homecoming; she's based in New York City and came home for her mom's 90th birthday.

It was a moment of pride for the entire class when our dancers went onstage in their
all-red costumes, Afro wigs and dark glasses. Their entrance was a scene straight out of  "Mod Squad" and "Charlie's Angels," two hit TV series from our era. 

Ana Earnshaw's husband, musician Spanky Rigor, did an oh-so-danceable remix of '70s disco tunes that I couldn't contain myself (so did the elegant Grace Palma, a finance executive from our batch), and we danced on the aisles of the James B. Reuter auditorium while cheering for our classmates. 

Some of our dancers have a late supper (from left): Jill Racela, Audrey Agatep, Maan Martin, Concept Zamora and Bibit Esteva

Except for a distracting flower vase, Table 35 was the table to join because it included the class representatives, dancers in the persons of Ana Earnshaw, Lyn Sanchez, Jenny (Concept's daughter who filmed the dance number), Jill, Audrey, Maan and Bibit.

Seated: Grace Palma and Jing Umali. Behind them is Pam Bañez.

From left: Grace, Jing, Adelle Nadres who served as assistant technical director and efficiently worked behind the scenes, Hayni Estrada and Marissa Ileto, member and head, respectively, of the slambook committee that produced our print souvenir to celebrate 40 years of our Paulinian spirit

More expressions of charm before my camera from Adelle, Hayni, Lulu Camello, Marissa and Vicki Narciso

Hey, girls, look this way! Seated are Jill, Audrey and Maan. Standing are (from left): Ana, Lyn, Adelle, Jing and Grace

Okay, one more time and all together now (except for Yoly de Leoz who had to leave earlier to return home to Laguna), seated are Jill, Audrey, Maan, Bibit and Babeth. Standing are Ana, Lyn, Adelle, Jing, Grace, Marissa, Punay Gonzales, Pam, Hayni, Vicki and Lulu

Thanks, too, to Pam and Maan for ruby souvenirs of red scarves and red heart bracelets. As classmate Bonjet Tolentino shouted in our Yahoo group: "Class of '73, you're awesome!"

The long program left us famished, and our batch regrouped for photos with my spouse taking most of them.

I knew in my heart that the 12th of January would be a good day to be capped by a good night as R and I took the midnight bus back to Baguio. There were long goodbyes to classmates who I'm not sure I will see again if I live long enough to see our golden jubilee.