Edna Reynoso Anton, lover of life, defier of death

I am writing to Blossom Dearie’s 1958 version of the song “They Say It’s Spring” while birds on a wing tweet their Tuesday song. I am thinking of the time writer-jazz singer Gou de Jesus and I accompanied restaurateur Edna Reynoso Anton to buy a karaoke at SM Baguio’s appliance center for home use. Once the machine was installed at her house, we took turns singing. Gou’s and my scores were in the 90s. (That was back when I wasn’t a croaking soprano yet.) When Edna’s turn came, the help got so alarmed by the sounds she was making. Maybe they thought that something was amiss—they came running to the sala from every corner of the house to check if everything was fine. Everything was fine; it was just Edna singing her heart out. Never mind if her scores were in the 50s. Continue to sing she did! The Edna approach to song must’ve been how she approached life, even her death. She passed away peacefully on March 9 after a long struggle with cancer. A priest gave her the last anointing while surrounded by family and love in her home, not in a hospital (that last detail gave me a source of relief). Her struggle lasted more than 10 years in my calculation. She lived up to her prediction at a Baguio Country Club breakfast when she announced to everyone present that she was leaving for treatment abroad and would even outlast some of the people present. And she did. While some of her contemporaries died one after the other, Edna just went on and on like the Eveready battery, attending birthday lunches (I saw her at either Des Bautista or his Auring’s birthday celebrations at Rose Bowl), masses (she heard soprano Myramae T. Meneses sing “Panis Angelicus” at St. Joseph the Worker Church in one anticipated Saturday mass because she couldn’t attend the Viva Voce Voice Lab concert), her own surprise 80th birthday party at the Forest Lodge with a luau theme. The last was where I saw her, still smiling and laughing with gusto, thrilled that her daughters, in-laws and grandchildren came home from Hawaii to help mark her milestone. The emcee gave away boxes and boxes of chocolate-covered macadamia nuts in a game of trivia about Edna and other things like her liking for the music of Elvis Presley.

Lovely Edna (seated) surrounded by her children and children-in-law

With her favorite grandson I felt privileged to see the somber side of Edna apart from that bubbly one. In 2015, as I was coming out of a long depression, she got in touch and invited me for coffee and dessert at O’mai Khan Restaurant. She picked the corner window where it was quiet. Then she told me in minute detail her battle with the cancer that had her yearlong schedule divided in this way: part of the year for treatment with Stanford doctors in California and recovery in Hawaii and another half of the year to pick up the threads of a life in Baguio where she was a community influencer long before that term came into vogue. She showed me her colostomy bag that explained why she could only take small meals at a time and would have the rest of the food wrapped as takeaway for a later meal. Even as she talked there were still hints of girlish giggle in her voice. I guess she wanted to demonstrate to me how all the burdens we carry could be aided by a certain outlook, one that always sees the lighter side of things. We continued to correspond through email wherever part of the world she was until her last years were spent with husband Mike who suffered a stroke. Of this she wrote, “It’s difficult to grow old, but I’m thankful Mike and I are still alive. Feeling pain means there’s life to fight for! Mike has been a fighter, too, after several bouts with pneumonia (three-week stay minimum in a hospital ) and even shingles! He’s blessed that the super itchy band was on the right side of his face which at that time was still affected by his stroke, so he was able to endure the pain, thank God for that!” In June 2021, writing from San Francisco, she said, “I’m… waiting for my eighth cancer surgery tomorrow at Stanford at 7 a.m. I had to leave Mike with Carlos (their son), his two nurses and two caregivers (all live-in due to Covid precautions) because my tumor has overgrown to about three kilos and needs debulking asap. I hope it is a simpler surgery than the one in 2014 where I stayed for two months at the Stanford hospital and another two months in a Stanford home care where nurses came three times a week to dress my wound and bathe me . “I want to go home soonest so I can be with Mike through his long healing journey. Health is really wealth, and as we grow older we realize that time is precious. “Be with Rolly as much as possible, continue showing your love for one another, and thank God you can enjoy life with your family as you can all lose it in a blink! Will write and update you soon. Love, Edna” To top it all, she suffered a fall, not a deadly one but enough to fracture her wrist. Let Edna tell it in her unique words: “Lately, I have been going down to Manila for the constant fitting of my new caps and dentures (matanda na talaga) and my visits to my orthopedic doctor regarding the nasty fall I had on the 13th of September. I didn’t realize I had a fracture above my wrist until I finally visited him and he ordered an X-ray done several days after. He warned me another nasty fall will be bad, hence I’m limiting my movements and no treadmill for now. I love the book you gave me... so touching!” Post-haste I shared with her my novena to the Blessed Mary to prevent falls: Take my hand, O Blessed Mother, Hold me firmly lest I fall. I grow nervous while walking And humbly on Thee I call. Guide me over every crossing; Watch me when I'm on the stairs; Let me know that you're beside me; Lead me to my destination safely. In every undertaking, my duties for the day, till evening creeps upon us, I'll never be alone. Once again, O dearest Mother, Take my hand and lead me home. Amen. She emailed quickly: “What a lovely prayer. Thanks Babeth. Love” So we send you off, Edna, with love and on a wing of another prayer for eternal peace. May the dessert table where you are now be as generous as the ones you used to prepare for your near and dear ones. And if you must insist on joining the heavenly choir, I say, why ever not?

Detail of Edna Anton's 80th's birthday cake

Fruitcake lovers

Rolly and I survived the wind and rain lashes of Typhoon Maring. I thought I’d reward him with something he loved—a whole fruitcake in a round, tin can and redolent with the strong scent of rum. He had worked hard sweeping the garage area free of fallen twigs and leaves. Serendipitously, I discovered a bakeshop in FB offering fruitcakes in different sizes. I ordered for delivery tomorrow, but the one taking my order said Divine Indulgence Cake Boutique could deliver immediately. Rolly paced the room until we heard the delivery guy motor up our gate. We shall indulge tonight!

Every day is Tatay's day

With our grandchild Kai. Tatay is how everybody in our household calls him. If they could speak human language, our two dogs would call him that, too. He is our bank and banker, teacher, gardener, cleaner, librarian, curator of objets d'art, occasional cook, marketing and grocery man, dishwasher, dog walker, disc jockey, crying post, steady rock, etc. No wonder he can get irascible sometimes when books are not in their proper spot on the shelf or when our beds are still unmade when the sun is already high. On Sundays, he is our champorado guy, mixing the tablea chocolate with malagkit until the dish reaches the proper consistency. Then he follows this up by frying dilis or tuyo. He calls us down for breakfast. I am joyful and grateful to have a husband and father like Rolly Fernandez in our home. Happy Tatay's Day from your girls Babeth, Kimi, Ida and Kai

Sweet banana

"Writers are like those good thieves. They take something that is real…and by a trick of magic they transform it into something totally fresh." ~ Isabel Allende I live with some kind of sinusitis that gets going in the morning, especially after I've eaten breakfast. I am assured that my poor sense of smell isn't a COVID-like symptom. But I need to do something about it because this morning, as I was preparing lunch, I didn't notice that the pot where my husband Rolly Fernandez was cooking plaintain bananas in sugar syrup, minatamis na saging, was about to dry. There was steam all over the kitchen. I was so focused on dicing the carrots and slicing the cloves of garlic that were supposed to go into my own pot of chicken with pineapples. My back was turned to the stove. Plus my ears were listening to the CD album of cellist Yo-Yo Ma. I even had a fleeting thought about how peaceful these all felt--the meditative gestures of dicing and slicing. Rolly rushed down the stairs holding the walis tingting and dustpan containing Satchi's poop, shouting that the house was almost on fire. I rose abruptly from my seat and quickly turned off the knob of the gas stove. He got rid of Satchi's leavings first before returning to scold me. We opened the pot and looked inside. The sugar had caramelized to a dark brown around each of the banana slice. I'm a girl who looks at the jug as half full so I told my partner, "We have banana cue for dessert!" Still much shaking of Rolly's head.

The dog who would be a reader

I just went through my digicam to check what's stored and found these pictures taken by my grandchild Kai. They're of Satchi and her master Rolly Fernandez lounging in the library where she loves to scoot over once released from the balcony that she has for her home. She loves Rolly's bed, rolls all over it before lying on her belly. She even likes to look at the books. When she wags her long, bushy tail, she knocks over Rolly's assorted knickknacks, including a framed bulletin of Bandilang Pula, a publication of the seven-day Diliman Commune, or our kids' snapshots. Once, and only once, did Satchi gnaw the spine of my book, Object Lessons: The Paris Review Presents the Art of the Short Story. What a scolding she received, but I doubt if she understood any word said. Something must have sunk in because there has been no repetition of the incident. She has maintained her respectful distance from the books. However, she still sniffs at them, her eyes glancing longingly over the titles. Somebody said Satchi must've been a reader in a former life. If she was, then she has found the right home.

Rewarding myself

When I work hard, I play harder. Playing includes writing and mailing letters, scribbling in my diary and reading or looking at art. Last week my daughter brought up a package I ordered from Nina L. Yuson consisting of her book Nina's Travel Sketches: Europe, a set of her postcards and another set of her heart-shaped, hand-sewn thingamajigs. The last will be trimmings for our 2020 Christmas tree, and yes, we're going all out in trimming the tree as an exercise in joy during an especially harrowing year. My husband Rolly and I take very good care in turning the pages of Nina's book. We find her drawings and watercolors delicate and fragile, even the way the book is constructed with a ring binder. But oh! We gasp at her skill in rendering, from a dog's, person's and bird's eye views, the places in the European continent that we working stiffs can only aspire to visit one day. Those spots remain an unreachable goal, never to be achieved in this lifetime given the swath of the COVID19 virus and our combined budgets. Even the artist, the founder of the Early Learning Center and the Museo Pambata on Roxas Blvd., has her own wish. She wrote in her foreword, "Although this is my fifth collection of sketches to be published, it is still my fervent wish that one day some of them will be chosen to adorn the menu covers of an airline, perhaps, our flag carrier, and what more I could see them on the side of an aircraft!" So what are you #reading this weekend? I'm reading, I'm looking and I'm unusually content.

I shall eat pie every single day (or until it runs out)

My family members are fans and followers of Sweets and Greens in Baguio. We relish its home deliveries of lemon pound cake that gives the taste of sweet and sour a new definition. Baguio-ites, hear this. They have a new product: Rhubarb Strawberry Pie. It is billed in their FB page as "juicy, sourly sweet, tangy and tart all wrapped up in a flaky, buttery crust." It's all that and more. It brings back memories of earlier times in my youth when the family gathered around the table for pie with a half gallon of vanilla ice cream waiting to turn it into a la mode. I distinctly recall the apple pie of Goodies N' Sweets at the old Greenhills Shopping Center that was the centerpiece of special gatherings. It came with a caramel sauce that was drizzled over the warm pie. Yesterday's pie arrived at exactly 11:32 a.m., right before we went down for lunch in the dining room. The family had been waiting for it since Friday. There was a miscommunication between the pie seller and me. I failed to check the order delivery date (Nov. 27, it said), expecting the pie on Nov. 20. You can't imagine the groan of disappointment from my family, especially from Rolly Fernandez, when I announced that our order had been moved back. I pleaded with seller to please move it by a few days forward. My plea was accommodated. We declined the custard that was supposed to be paired with the pie, saying we'd have ice cream on top of it. And that we did with matching rolling of eyes till the whites showed. Yeah, I know, a bit exaggerated in comparing the eating to an orgasmic experience. But it was. Photos by Kimi Fernandez

Some like it sour

This pandemic has been kind to some small businesses, particularly the ones involving food delivery.

For the past two weeks, we've had different kinds of bread delivered to our door by the Baguio-based baker from Sweets and Greens. My daughter Kimi discovered the outfit through a Facebook ad and decided to try it out after being enticed by photos of its products.

It was love at first bite when Kai sliced and tasted the glazed lemon pound cake. She can easily finish half of it spread over a few hours between meals.

There's a variation of that bread, this time with herbs baked into it. It is just as good and lemony (sour, not sweet).

Sweets and Greens delivers to Baguio residents every Tuesday and Friday. This is not an ad. It is a full endorsement. Let's support our local bakers.

As for Rolly, he would like it better if the pound cake was heavily infused and aged with rum.

Some things I miss

On this throwback Thursday, I look back to the year 2015 when my family and I took eating out for granted. I also took for granted that the natural curls on my grandchild's head would stay there for good, but we enjoyed them for less than a year. The minute she had a haircut, the curls refused to grow back.

That was also the year I wore my "Mrs. E sunglasses" all over the place until one day at the UP Infirmary in Diliman, while I was distracted, I placed the pair down a side table and forgot about it.

Wearing Mrs. E (as in Epistola) sunglasses with curly-haired Kai behind me

Al fresco dining at Chaya Baguio

Matcha ice cream with red mongo

Baguio used to be known as a restaurant hub until COVID-19 put a stop to our frequent dining out. Although we're glad to learn that CHAYA Baguio remains open for take-out and delivery, my daughter Kimi, the expert on the subject, says Japanese food isn't quite as good as when you eat it in situ with all the elegant ceramic ware. The food doesn't travel well, and we live outside city limits.

What I terribly miss is the free after-meal matcha ice cream that Chaya serves in a mini bowl with a sliver of red mongo beans. Don't even say the word "sukiyaki" or else I will weep copious tears.

Let's play 'Pretend'

Give my apo Kai a cloth diaper or a newly washed bimpo, and she can cast all her other toys away. When she learned to tinker with her mother's cellphone, she has been applying all sorts of funny faces on whoever held it. Her grumpa was no sacred exemption. I like how she rendered Rolly Fernandez into a Charlie Chaplin of sorts, herself she depicted as Catgirl. In real life, she dressed up Satchi as Superdog.

Rolly Chaplin

Kai Catgirl

Satchi Superdog

In the beginning of the lockdown, I imagined I was part of the story and cast of The Diary of Anne Frank. There I was, hiding away in an alcove with my red leatherette-bound Mercury Drugstore diary which I would sneak out when everyone else was asleep or busy and where I would write entries to help make mere survival bearable. But the Frank family's enemy was a palpable one--the German Nazis. This one that we have is invisible and just as deadly.

Well, this was my way of coping in the early weeks of the lockdown--to pretend, maybe a way of denial of the harshness of COVID-19. I've taken refuge in the patched up videos of choirs and orchestras and vocal soloists.

I've also begun counting the riches still available to us.

Jamie Tworkowskie named them for us:

Conversations will not be cancelled.
Relationships will not be cancelled.
Love will not be cancelled.
Songs will not be cancelled.
Reading will not be cancelled.
Self-care will not be cancelled.
Hope will not be cancelled.
May we lean into the good stuff that remains.

Despite my family's distance in Baguio, they can still manage to smile for the phone camera and clown around. Only Satchi has, what I imagine to be, a thought bubble that reads, "Bah! These humans!"

Silence and pudding

"How much better is silence; the coffee cup, the table. How much better to sit by myself like the solitary sea-bird that opens its wings on the stake. Let me sit here for ever with bare things, this coffee cup, this knife,things in themselves, myself being myself." ~ Virginia Woolf

I don't watch much TV or Netflix. I allow 15 minutes of CNN news, strictly after lunch only, to puncture my isolation from the world. Everything else is ambient noise, even the hyper reading of the news and the airing of opinions in radio station DZBB where my brother tunes in every breakfast.

The rest of the day is "wasted" on words. I grapple with words before this seven-year old laptop that threatens to crash any day now. I'm in a race to write about people I know, experiences I've been through, including those involving the senses of smell and taste. I think I can last in a retreat that requires two days of full silence. Just give me this well-worn computer with the thick photo folders, and I'll be all right. Yes, sir, I will.

Newsman reading his newspaper

But I don't think I'll last another month without my companion in silence, Rolly Fernandez. We have a routine of sharing breakfast in companionable silence whether in Baguio or Pasig. Picture shows him reading the day's issue of the Inquirer at Epic Cafè with a cup of black coffee, unsweetened, before him. When I still had a camera, I liked taking un-posed pictures of him.

When we parted in early March, talk of a Luzon-wide lockdown was very far from our thoughts. The agreement was once I was up and about and walking confidently, I'd take the bus back to Baguio in time for our grandchild's ninth birthday. Then Force Majeure came down heavily and ruined all our plans.

But let not talk of lockdowns and morbidity and mortality statistics take the #SimplePleasures out of our lives. At Epic on that ordinary day when Rolly and I each had a plate of Tapsilog, we ended our meal with a shared plate of pudding. We didn't even need a consensus on what dessert we'd have. We just looked at the tray of bread pudding, our eyes met, then an order was placed for a slice of heaven on earth.

Bread pudding with epic taste

Suddenly, she is 9

I woke up to Nash Tysmans' angry tweet: "Ang Amerika hindi rin preparado kasi ungas din ang Pangulo nila! #OUSTDUTERTENOW"

And to Pablo Tariman's angrier FB status, since then deleted, methinks, about the foul mouth of the Leader and how a janitor has more dignity than he who lives in Malacanang Palace. Nothing like a morning swim to calm Pablo down.

The malicious aspersions cast on Atty. Chel Diokno were causing me to roil and boil at 5:30 a.m., my usual time of waking. It wasn't a good way to start a Saturday, especially since today is special.

It is the ninth birthday of my granddaughter Kai. I bemoan that I am separated from her by 209 kilometers, and no bus is plying the Cubao to Baguio route so I can't be there to watch her blow an imaginary candle on a small birthday cake. Imaginary because blowing birthday candles is among the no-no's during the time of COVID-19. Small cake because she has no other guests beyond her mother Kimi, her grandpa Rolly Fernandez and our dogs Satchi and Boots.

She was up early, acknowledging text greetings from relatives here and abroad. Apart from "Thank you," she punched in the words, "Stay safe! God bless!" Then we teased her with a video call, singing the birthday song. My daughter Ida, phoning in from Los Angeles, CA, couldn't suppress the schoolteacher in her, asking Kai for the correct spelling of lumpiang Shanghai. In one of her communications, Kai wrote that "lumpiang Shang High" would be among the dishes served at her modest celebration.

Then we asked how she and her buddy Satchi, a golden retriever, were doing. As answer, she brought the phone outdoors to the Baguio balcony so we could see the dog sniffing out the birthday gal.

Baguio girl's carrot cake

A girl and her dog

Earlier in the week, she showed us a drawing of a slice of carrot cake, a manifestation of her heart's desire. She has remained cheery of disposition despite missing her lowland-based cousins and slew of grandaunts and granduncles, they who dote on her, her classmates, her play-date mates and her teachers.

Sadness over the quiet commemoration of her birthday is alien to her. As I write these words, the John Wilson Orchestra is performing Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue," and on this day divided by broiling political forces, I wish you, Kai, a rhapsody in yellow... as in sunshine, sunflowers and sunny smiles. And hope!

Missing the secret garden

(Take 2, after losing my original draft)

I've been revisiting photo files from the year 2015. The year was personally memorable because I was taken ill for quite a while and confined at length at The Medical City.

When I returned to the world that was still spinning at its usual pace despite my prolonged depressive episode, I wasn't allowed to go out of the house unless I was chaperoned. My usual companion and chokaran then was Macky, the yaya of my then four-year old grandchild Kai. (While Macky, short for Mackenzie, kept me company, my mother, who has since passed on, and my daughter Kimi minded Kai who was pulled out of school in Baguio to be with me.)

So being housebound or being under strict house arrest is nothing new to me. When I was allowed a little freedom of movement, Macky accompanied me to the lecture of balikbayan poet Luisa A. Igloria at De La Salle University. Not only was the lecture substantive that I was able to compose an article out of Dr. Igloria's lecture notes, the event was well organized by Shirley O. Lua of DLSU. I remember the savory adobo served.

So my new life, post-hospitalization, revolved around weekend trips to Baguio and weekdays spent correcting my students' papers, preparing lessons, chasing after story sources (life of a freelancer).

Rolly in a huddle with his UP Baguio colleagues Del Tolentino (partly hidden) and Rey Rimando

It was around this time when my husband Rolly Fernandez thought of converting an idle patch in our Baguio property into what we called "a secret garden" dedicated to Kai. He had a truck haul in the pebbles, which were scattered and arranged neatly on the ground. He tamed the wildness by planting shrubs and flowering bushes. Then he invited our friend Rey Rimando, a retired math prof at UP Baguio and full-time gardener in La Union, for a visit.

Rey being Rey, he had opinions on everything from the foot path to the watering system. He offered advice on what plants thrived in the shade and what liked the sun. Rolly nodded, but knowing him, I knew he was separating chaff from the grain.

Name that wildflower.

Since then, the garden became the final stop where Kai and I parked ourselves after our morning walks in the neighborhood. Her paternal grandparents presented her with a garden set complete with a parasol. While we chattered and took pictures of the flowers, Rolly would join us with his second or third mug of coffee. We had Baguio's immense blue, blue sky for our roof.

Kai stops to pose for a picture at a neighbor's garden.

I miss the little garden and the refuge it offered. As I encode these words, I'm pale from want of sun and Vitamin D. Once the lockdown is lifted, you know which direction I'm headed for: my true North.

Meanwhile, there is comfort in the verse of Nobel laureate Czeslaw Milosz:

My generation was lost. Cities too. And nations.
But all this a little later. Meanwhile, in the window, a swallow

#LockdownDiaries

Para Isabel

The 20th of March, decreed in some calendars as International Day of Happiness, opened for me at almost 3 a.m., the time of deepest slumber for a lot of people. I thought I was just hungry because I had skipped dinner last night.

My restlessness led me to turn on the computer and to my chagrin, I saw the face of the Leader in a pre-dawn press conference announcing stricter LGU compliance of presidential directives.

I couldn't return to the peace of sleep as I heard this Rambling Man (Ernesto V. Enrique's most apt description of him) go on so I visited the author Isabel Allende's website. I found two photos of her, as a young writer with ciggy in hand and face averted from her typewriter. It reminded me of a younger me when I was all angst and anxiety over the paucity of my writerly output.

A young Isabel Allende at her typewriter

Isabel, see how familiar I am with her, has 23 books so far to her name. I have read eight of them, Paula being my favorite followed by Aphrodite: A Memoir of the Senses. In comparison to my idol, I have written just four books, Catholic and Emancipated (personal essays), The First Eye, dangling doll: poems of laughter & desperation and Big Mama Sez: Poems Old & New, the last three in limited editions of 200 copies or less. I have a fifth manuscript (also poetry), Moon Hanging Low Over My Window, awaiting publication when things finally go back to some kind of normal.

But the Numero Uno fan of Isabel in the family is my husband Rolly Fernandez. At our long stop at The Last Bookstore in Los Angeles in November last year, he loaded up his shopping cart with all of Isabel's books that he had not yet read. And because of the prodigious-ness of the author, he piled up softbound and hardbound copies alike. That's the bibliomaniac in the family at work.

The second photo of Isabel also reminded me of an older me--less uptight, less self-focused, still introverted but capable of throwing open my arms to embrace a new day. Remember that this Chilean author knew what it was like to live under an authoritarian regime that killed her uncle and godfather, the democratically elected Salvador Allende.

Allende today

Now I am the one who's rambling. Her injunction to "write what should not be forgotten" is what is keeping me busy and buzzing these days despite the lockdown that has prevented my physical movements. In the recent past, my work as a freelance journalist enabled me to freely seek out sources for stories or events to cover. I have started this, my own version of the #LockdownDiaries.

Ahhh, on this day set aside for happiness, I salute you, Isabel, for your great capacity for joy despite irreversible losses of loved ones in your life. We should emulate someone like her.

A girl and her dog

This morning Satchi, our golden retriever, came bounding up the stairs. I called out her name, and she entered our bedroom instead of heading for the balcony which is where she stays most of the day after her walks.

She slobbered all over my husband Rolly's face as he was snoozing. She refused the treat that my daughter Kimi was trying to entice her with.

This seven-month old golden is, most of all, Kai's best pal. Apart from walks, they chase one another or Kai talks to her in a commanding voice to make the dog obey. The latter doesn't seem to work yet because it provokes Satchi to get more excited and jump all over my apo. They're a happy sight to behold.

Last Saturday, as Kai and her father took Satchi for her morning walk, she loosened herself from her lease and ran all over the village park, the little girl giving chase and breaking into tears, thinking the dog might get lost.

Satchi found her way home alone and waited for the gate to open. Kai cried more tears of relief.

All in a day. With Satchi, our lives are complete.

Photo by KIMI FERNANDEZ

Rain, food, books and work

Today's weather was not an improvement on yesterday's. We woke up to ceaseless wind, rain and fog. At least, I did wake up ahead of everyone else in our small household; Rolly, who is usually an early riser, got up reluctantly at 9:30 a.m.

Nobody was in the mood to cook although we were all famished and wished for hot soup, arroz caldo, fried rice and tuyo--you know, rainy weather fare. But who was gonna prepare them?

Not I, said this housewife who has never gotten the hang of running a house. I had too much writing and editing work, chief of which was a book manuscript, on my plate, and deadlines were a pitiless lot.

So I said, I'm treating everyone to lunch at HOY (short for House of Yolo Yogurt) on Marcos Highway, a few minutes drive away from our place. Rolly couldn't be parted from his bed and blanket so Kimi, Kai and I dressed warmly and each carried an umbrella to the car.

I told Kimi to drive carefully through the zero-visibility fog, fearing she might bump into a stray dog or a human. We reached HOY without incident. Hardly had we sat, then the place began to fill up despite it being way past the lunch hour. Then we realized today was a holiday--Eid Mubarak!

Hot choco for my grandchild Kai

Daing na bangus with red mountain rice and fried eggs

Booboo Babeth looking ghostly amid the thick fog. Photo by Kai

Kai back in the warmth of Rolly Fernandez's room/library. Photo by Babeth

I settled for my favorite daing na bangus with mountain rice and two well-done fried eggs. Kimi had the bulalo which was for sharing. Kai had a little of my viand and her mother's, paired with a cup of rice and another cup of hot choco.

While Kimi was driving home through the zigzag road, I told her to slow down because I had a very full tummy and didn't want to throw up.

We brought home takeaway food (sirloin tapa with rice and sunny side up eggs) for Rolly. In all, it was a blessed day, the weather notwithstanding.

A Saturday afternoon in Baguio

As Saturday afternoons go in these parts, the clouds were gray. Weather was drizzly, but that didn't deter my grandchild Kai and I from having a good day. We had it all planned out. She would document the day in pictures, I would describe it in words.

We started off with a late dimsum lunch at the fairly new King Chef Dimsum Kitchen on Legarda Road with long-time friends Jenny Carino and Karen Hizola. My daughter Kimi drove us afterwards to a nearby Korean grocery so we could enjoy frozen yogurt popsicles, the Lotte brand, then onto Mt Cloud Bookshop at No. 1 Yangco Road. There I saw, after many, many years had passed, Ani Rosa Almario of Adarna House at the registration table.

With Karen Hizola sporting her new hairdo and Jennifer Patricia A. Cariño

I used to see her as a child when her parents Rio and Lyn Almario would visit SV and Nieves Epistola of the University of the Philippines Diliman. I think she even drew a portrait of me wearing my lace-up ballet shoes (I was thin then and studying jazz at the Julie Borromeo Dance Arts Studio).

Kids had to each pay P100 to get into the story-telling event. Adults accompanying them got in free. Kai had time to roam around the shop, clicking the digicam, a well-worn Canon PowerShot A2300 HD.

She picked out the book edited by Neni Sta Romana Cruz, Don't Take a Bath on a Friday, asking if I could purchase it. I told her we had a copy at home, and she only had to ask her grumpa Rolly to retrieve it from one of our bookshelves (he's only our librarian apart from being house manager). Nonetheless, she sprawled on the throw pillows and mat that Marisol Michele Montilla's staff had laid out on the floor and began reading said book.

Marisol Montilla introduces story-teller Rey Bufi.

Then she perused the shelf for knitted stuffed toys and took down the whale shark with a pleading look in her eyes. I looked at the price tag and shook my head. She went to the "bookstore within a bookstore" (as Marisol called the children's book room) and chose Alamat ng Ampalaya by Augie Rivera with illustrations by Kora Dandan Albano. At P100 a copy, it was most affordable, and Kai now has it on her shelf.

Rey Bufi of The Story-telling Project captured the children's attention with his expressive narration of two titles: Candy Gourlay's Is It a Mermaid? in its Filipino translation and Padmapani L. Perez's Shelah Goes to a Da-ngah.

Kuya Rey gathering all the children on the mat

Ice breaker

Even if there were kids as young as three years old in the audience, they weren't restive at all and were putty in Kuya Rey's hands.

Immediately after the story-telling, Ani came up front to distribute mini red velvet cupcakes to the young audience and their parents and guardians.

Two cupcakes: Kai and the red velvet cupcake from Ani Almario

The Adarna and Mt. Cloud teams pose by the Adarna House van

Baby pine trees

While we awaited Rolly to fetch us, Kai roamed the kid-friendly store and grounds and took more pictures of the pine saplings and the Adarna and Mt. Cloud teams posing by the Adarna van.

Except for my portrait of Kai with a cupcake, all photos are by her.

Kai's shelfie

We live with an eight-year-old reader, Kai, who is also adept with gadgets but isn't addicted to them (yet). Her time with her video games is limited by us. She doesn't whine for extended time with her electronic toys.

In fact, she still plays with old plush toys and Disney dolls--that means conversing with them, laying them out on my bed, seating them on my pillows and covering them with my shawl or a short blanket.

When she sees me reading though, she imitates me, gets her own book and quietly settles at a corner. Sometimes she falls asleep as I do, too. When she wakens, she asks how long she was out. When I say an hour or two, her eyebrows meet and she worriedly says, "I may have a hard time sleeping tonight." I just advise her to read or reread a favorite book again.

For many years, Old MacDonald's Had a Farm was her favorite. These days, she rereads Roald Dahl's titles for kids and watches on Netflix the film version of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I don't know how many times she has sat through it.

On the foreground is the feminist storybook Prince Cinders by Babette Cole, a favorite of my own children, Kimi and Ida, when they were as old as Kai.

In the summer of 2018, her grumpa Rolly Fernandez built for her her own shelves for her books and toys. The shelves were made of recycled materials--two old cabinet doors that the carpenters cut up to Rolly's specifications.

Sometimes Kai and her cousin Max, seen in second photo at last night's premiere of The Lion King at Ayala the 30th Mall in Pasig, swap books.

Cousins Max and Kai at a movie premiere

As poet Luisa A. Igloria once wrote in her FB status, don't show us your selfies. Show your shelfies!

To Kai and Max I only wish a Happy National Children's Book Day every day.

Space of my own

I was in Mega Manila for 10 days and came back to my Baguio room and adjusted to the new changes my husband Rolly Fernandez made on our shared space. We used to have a small table between our single beds and shared a lamp for night reading between us.

Now he moved my work table between our beds and put my growing pile of books half-read, unread and intended to be read on our grandchild's table. (Wait till we hear what she has to say about this when she herself arrives from her Manila summer break.)

This is where all the writing action takes place. The blue comb is there for the purpose of running through my hair to help me think.

I like where he shoved my old bed--nearer to the window where I can have more natural light while reading or writing in my journal. As for the work table's new space, I now have windows with a view of the neighbors' greenery. I can take 20-minute breaks from computer chores and rest my eyes on said neighbors' green roofs, the pine trees and plants whose green colors are sharpened by the rain.

That he doesn't ask my permission to move things around in our room I don't mind. Rolly knows best--whether it's housekeeping, drawing up a menu, picking out items to put in the grocery cart or gardening.

As you can see, I'm not good for anything in terms of decorating space. Gosh, he even fixed my table where everything is now in place and there's a place for everything.

Grateful Wednesday!

4 besties and 3 cups of gelato

An embarrassment of creamy richness!

At first the idea of having an ice cream parlor or a gelato shop in Baguio seemed as silly as carrying coals to Newcastle. And opening in February when the temperature in the city hovers between 11 to 14 degrees C in the evening and at certain times in the morning while people are bundled up like it's spring or fall in another country?

Yet people are streaming in at the newly opened Monte Gelati inside the Albergo Hotel on Villamor Drive And not just because the tables at Amare la cucina are already full and the owner/s just had to open another room for the spillover crowd.

Each time our small family of four eats out, we consult the youngest member, Kai, who pipes up heartily, "Amare!" Like the restaurant's name, she loves its pesto pasta and pizza Margherita. When budget allows and appetites are not appeased, we have the fall-off-the-bones ribs, too. The mint gelato is always an order for one with a request for four teaspoons.

With a mural of a snow-covered part of..well, I'm guessing it's the Alpine region. The caricature of the mustachioed gentleman offering a cone of gelati of different flavor is that of the Amare and Monte Gelati owner

But when we saw that Monte Gelati was open, we decided on feasting our eyes on the colors of the frozen desserts first, accepting free tastings before choosing what we'd each have. Our daughter Kimi and her Kai shared a cup of cookie butter. I went for something safe like the mango. Rolly Fernandez had his fave rum raisin, the flavor he goes for when we're in Pasig and hanging out at Poco Deli.

According to the waiting staff who served us, Amare's adventurous owner is initially introducing 16 (!!!) flavors to include biscotti, Red Horse, mango, rum raisin, cookie butter, mint, Amarena, matcha, strawberry, chocolate, dark chocolate, nutella, guyabano, dragonfruit, pistachio and Cabernet, the last to mean Cabernet Sauvignon with strong hints of red wine?

It seemed to me a perfect way to get tipsy after a hearty Eye-talian meal. Thank you, Amare, for giving us good reason to return.

Date night for two old fogies in a clean, well-lighted place

Photos by Kimi Fernandez