Still on the back roads of my mind

I revisited my blog, brooksidebaby.blogspot.com, to search for old pictures of the late Mercy Fabros that her daughter May-i requested. I sent her links to blog entries where her Nanay was mentioned or quoted.

I am posting these three pictures of Mercy. The first two show us attending Viva Voce's "Complicated the Concert" in 2014 at the former Lopez Museum and Library on Textite Road, Pasig. The building that housed said museum and library is no more. It will assume another form in Rockwell Makati, but when that will open, I am not privy to that info. It just adds to the grief over lost people and lost stomping grounds in one's life.

Viva Voce's Camille Lopez Molina and Myramae T. Meneses bookend me and Mercy Fabros.

Color-coordinated! From left: Joseph Uy, Mher U. Nival, Mercedes Fabros, Ivan Niccolo Nery and me

In that concert, Mercy and I heard Raymond Yadao sing Julian Celis Bautista's kundiman "Parang Maghapon Lamang." We felt the hair on our arms rise. In the blog, I wrote that the Levi Celerio lyrics told of youth wasted: "Even if it feels like the length of a life, whether it ends at age 27 or at age 88, is long in earth-time, in the eyes of Eternity, it is only the equivalent of an afternoon."

Ang buhay ko’y maghapon lang pala

Tila isang saglit sa akin ang ngumingiting umaga!

May awit ang ibong tanda ng pag-asa!

Pagsapit ng hapon, ay!, kay lungkot sa puso kong nagdurusa!

Kung katotohanan ay ganyan,

Bakit sinayang ko yaong unang sigla ng aking buhay!

Di na magbabalik kahit na kaylan man

O! ang buhay pala ay parang maghapon lamang!

The third photo shows Mercy cradling my grandchild Kai. My daughter Kimi Fernandez had just "graduated" from Lamaze class with a successful childbirth, Dr. Melendre Araos as her attending OB-GYN.

My gratitude to Mercy and Melen is as boundless as the mysterious love that binds sisters together.

Pocketful of mercies

Like many of the members of my generation, she was my Lamaze teacher as I got ready to birth my firstborn child Kimi Fernandez. When I was pregnant with my second two years later, Mercy Fabros gave me pointers to remember the breathing and relaxation exercises we had studied before that saw me through a quick labor and delivery.

She was also my breastfeeding coach along with members of the Gabay at Kalinga ng mga Ina (fellow Paulinians Meran Daza Umali, Connie Estrada Calimon). Such was her commitment to the Our Bodies Ourselves movement that I was so infected with wanting to give my daughters nothing but breast milk in their early years. I practiced tandem nursing. I weaned each child from the breast at age three. It got to the point that Gilda Cordero Fernando asked me, "What else are you doing when you're not busy being a cow?" Mercy was in that phase of my life quietly supportive.

As she was when it was Kimi's turn to carry her child Kai to full term. After an uneventful birth, Mercy and I referred to Kai by the possessive OUR apo. It was at this point nine years ago when we became closer. She was a regular paying supporter of Pablo Tariman's intimate concert series at the former Kiss the Cook Gourmet on Maginhawa Street and later at Balay Kalinaw, UP Diliman. At the end of each event, she'd inquire, again in that concerned way of hers, if the concert organizer broke even. Most times, he didn't, but he'd reassure her, "Life is beautiful."

She became part of what I called the opera barkada, a group of retired and semi-retired friends that enjoyed the classics, mostly performed at the Ayala Museum lobby. Usually coming from the Diliman campus, she took the MRT to SM Makati, then walked towards the museum. Or she'd take the Point to Point bus to and fro. Such was her enviable stamina--this woman who was part of a walking group also around the UP Oval.

At the end of the Mario Lanza recital produced by Joseph Uy and Al Andres Andres at Ayala Museum. Seated is soprano Stephanie Anne Gastrock Aguilar. Standing from left: the two Jennys, Jenny Juan and Jenny Llaguno, Marne Kilates, Babeth, Nympha Sano, Mercedes Fabros, Grace Banez, Melendre Araos and Gabriel Allan Ferros Paguirigan. At the back is tenor Mher U. Nival.

At the closing rites of Dame Nelly Miricioiu-Kirk 2015 masterclass at the Ayala Museum. From left: Mercedes Fabros, Jenny Juan, Nelly and Babeth trying the open back position earlier demonstrated by the diva.

Fortieth day following the death of sculptor Jerry Araos at the Garden of Two Dragons in Antipolo City. Seated: Babeth, Bani Lansang and Princess Nemenzo. Standing are Stef Sano, Steve B. Salonga, Victor Corpus, Pablo Tariman and Mercedes Fabros.

That rare occasion when Mercy Fabros wore eye shadow as a nod to the costume party/ball that marked the vernissage of Gilda Cordero Fernando's 2014 show "Same Difference: Ganon pa din ang diperensya" at Silverlens Galleries. From left: Anna Leah Sarabia, Mercedes Fabros, Babeth and Rolly Fernandez

Mercedes Fabros (right) could be counted on to turn up at friends' milestones, in this case Sinag De Leon's and Babeth's joint art exhibit in November 2018 at Gourmet Gypsy Art Cafe. From left: Anna Leah Sarabia, Sheila Nicolas, Bobbie Malay, Virginia Moreno, Melendre Araos, Fe Mangahas, Barbara Mae Dacanay, Jenny Juan, Sinag and Mercy.

Post-intimate concert at Balay Kalinaw. Mercedes Fabros lent her presence again. From left are Lorna Kalaw Tiro, Anna Leah Sarabia, Neni Sta Romana Cruz, Ivi Avellana Cosio, Maria Karina Africa Bolasco and Sheila Coronel. I am seated with Mercy's eldest grandchild Alon.

From March 9 to 11 of 2015, we sat together at an Ayala Museum function room as Romanian-British diva Nelly Miricioiu-Kirk conducted a masterclass for Filipino singers. Mercy explained, over lunch at Dulcinea's to which she treated me, why she was present for consecutive days after seeing Dame Nelly already perform at the Meralco Theater, "This is my birthday gift to myself." We both believed Nelly was not just an excellent vocal coach but a practical life coach for people like us.

Furthermore, we witnessed with our eyes and ears the big difference the singers made once they went through the hands of Nelly.

Mercy's death is still weighing a ton on me, a mere mortal who can't be brave in the face of loss. The tears I cried earlier have stopped, but the mourning hasn't. The months April and May have been personally cruel as one friend after another was stricken and called home. Home to where "mercies are new every morning."

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!"

Self-care despite COVID-19

My head of black, white and gray hair looks like a nest fit for birds. Any day now when I step out into the garden for my few minutes of sun, I can half expect a mother sparrow to relocate her hungry chicks on top of my head. The image makes me chuckle inside, especially after I saw this illustration by Arli Pagaduan posted by Ang Ilustrador ng Kabataan.

Among the first things I will do after April 30, that is, if the enhanced community quarantine isn't extended again, is to get a haircut, a short, summery one, with my stylist, a flamboyant gay named Ruby. I entrust my head of hair to him/her alone and nobody else.

My sisters have been volunteering to trim my hair and lessen the volume (thus lessening the body heat I feel inside), but I've stubbornly refused their offer. Baka madisgrasya pa, and Ruby will be left to do major damage control.

Allow me this bit of vanity even in the midst of a worldwide pandemic. I found an old hairband, probably belonging to my late mother, and I've used it to tame my hair, push back the unruly bangs that threaten to cover my eyes as I stoop over this keyboard to finish my entry to the #LockdownDiaries series.

I'm sure many others have their own to-do list after the lockdown is lifted. A lot will be going to salons, I betcha, to get that overall feeling of well-being again. I dare not work on my cuticles myself--I'll leave that to the manicurist who's going to get a generous tip from yours truly. No, I'm not getting a facial--am not into that yet. I'm your basic scrub-your-face-with-soap-and-water type. But a radical haircut does sound good. That is enough.

Masked

There's a story behind this all-cotton face mask sewn for me by Aya Justiniani of Aya's Store. I needed such masks for my then repeated trips to the Medical City for the rehab of my new knee until the physical therapy sessions were suspended due to the COVID-19 crisis.

Still, I thought the family should invest in masks should we need to go out, eventually. The items available in the drugstores or supermarkets were the disposable, not eco-friendly, kind.

Under what Dr. Melendre Araos now calls "the new normal," masks will be part of our outfits, whether we like it or not. And for immuno-compromised individuals like myself who has to live with hypertension and diabetes, there's no arguing anymore about what's comfy and what's not.

Amy Tan, in her FB author's page, showed how stylish masks can be made to look even for someone in her late 60s.

And then I saw Aya's wares in Facebook. She was making and selling them for Pph25 each for the adult size, Php15 for the kid's. My sisters and I decided to commission her to sew 52 masks, some for shipping to Iloilo.

We received our orders yesterday, thanks to a quick online banking transfer and Lalamove PH Delivery. Aya carefully and lovingly folded her paninda in individualized plastic resealable packs. The packs can be recycled later to contain maybe one's fancy earrings or necklaces to protect them from dust.

When I showed my mask, one of six varieties in my collection, Martin Masadao had the capital idea of also bringing his retazos to some old gentlemen tailors in San Andres, Manila, to give them business during a difficult period. When Jennifer Patricia A. Cariño saw mine, she said friends in Baguio have also taken up sewing these things. Let's keep the sewing going.

I'm not saying a mask will completely shield you from the notorious virus. But with life's full promise still awaiting us after the lockdown, it's best not to take risks so we can sing, like Shirley Horn or Gou de Jesus, when we emerge from the quarantine: "So here's to life / And every joy it brings / So here's to life / To dreamers and their dreams."

The reluctant kitchen helper

Perhaps in the next life I'll aspire to be like writer Fran Lebowitz, described by The New Yorker as "the patron saint of staying at home and doing nothing. She is famously averse to working, and famously resistant to technology; she has no cell phone or computer."

After years of being on the work treadmill, I've slid into semi-retirement with joyful relief, looking forward to my monthly SSS pension--not much but enough to treat myself and loved ones to a special meal. In my broken cell phone are the numbers of favorite restaurants, especially takeaway places. Until the malls open and I can find a technician to save my SIM, I am phone-less. I can be reached through email and FB messenger.

Lebowitz doesn't suffer from writer's block but what she calls "writer's blockade." Like her, I hate to cook, let alone help prepare while someone else cooks.

Two days ago, my sister disturbed my reading to ask me to help her grate some carrots. It took me 15 minutes to rise from my chair and walk in slow motion to the door leading out of the bedroom and onto the kitchen. By the time I got there, the request changed to if I could separate the uncooked lumpia wrappers one by one. I told myself this could be a chance for a meditative exercise, and it was.

Our cutie

Sukiyaki by CHAYA Baguio

Toddler feeding herself

Sushi madness

Last night, my foodie apo messaged me on FB, inquiring what we had for brekkie, lunch and dinner. I answered straightaway: brekkie, champorado with milk donated by the barangay; lunch, lumpiang Shanghai; and dinner, salmon sinigang.

"Awwww," she responded. I realized those were all her favorites, prepared for her lovingly by doting grumpa Rolly Fernandez and her mother Kimi. Second realization was how blessed we were to have three filling meals a day as the quarantine continues to enhance hunger pangs among the majority.

I'm not promising a changed me who will suddenly embrace kitchen chores. But I vow to always have a clean plate after meals.

Photos show a younger Kai at our favorite Japanese restaurant, CHAYA Baguio, where we love the sukiyaki and sushi, where we cap our meals with matcha ice cream.

Here's to more unlocking of the pleasures of the palate while time is on our side.

Balancing act

I thought I'd put this old photograph here to remind me how woebegone this Wednesday has been. I couldn't dream up a topic I could passably write about.

My inner censor has been working double time, cancelling such subjects as My Mother's Paksiw na Pata, an ode to Mom's meat dish redolent with banana blossoms, laurel leaves and black pepper, with a thick soy-based sauce (censor said it's Holy Week, a time of fasting from red meat, and a rich dish may be offensive to those who are hungry); the unfinished bottle of eau de toilette, lavender scent, from friend Chit Santos (I couldn't possibly dress up, only to realize I have nowhere to go and thus dabbing the behinds of my ears and the base of my neck with lavender was out of the question); mastering the pressing of the snooze button which Bruno Lancelot Lolarga has done by napping in the morning, in the afternoon, then enjoying a full night's sleep, except for peeing time around midnight (see, El President, you are not alone, but Bruno is more handsome than you'll ever aspire to be even if you smoothen the pores on your nose).

Those are the subjects I ticked off mentally as I went about my day. But I did a Bruno--going on snooze mode at 10 a.m., then at 2 p.m. again until a compulsion to record my day impelled me to turn on the computer and attempt something.

I responded to the posts of friends like Pablo Tariman whose short tribute to Kerima Polotan triggered a memory of what might have been an encounter on the phone with the lady. Turns out I was speaking to her secretary, not The Kerima herself. But for many years I deluded myself into imagining it was the legendary writer whose voice I heard on the other end of the phone, inviting me over to pick up my contributor's fees. The fees were my first from a national publication, and I spent all the money on pocketbooks at the old PECO (Philippine Education Company) bookstore in downtown Manila.

If anything, this limbering exercise, a prelude to real writing, is a reminder for me to do more actual physical exercises--the mind loves a walk. Look at Elmer A. Ordoñez, the literary critic, novelist, essayist, who comes back from his evening walks with a Facebook status that reads like a haiku or a tanka. I imagine him with a mandarin painter beside him rendering the images of tagak and frolicking calf into a haiga to deepen the meaning further of the FB status.

My grandchild's pose states, yes, balance there, Booboo (her pet name for me). More walks, more sunshine to get the adrenaline running anew.

A pandemic dream

In this dream I am living in a bahay kubo that only has a roof and a floor. No walls, except for four bamboo posts. A strong wind hurls the house, like what you see happening in movies about twisters and tornadoes. As the house tumbles in the air that takes it higher and higher, I cling to one of the posts and cry out for my mother to help me, to save me. In my mind, I am aware she is dead, but nonetheless she appears, and like an angel, sets down my house on the ground again. Dream ends there.

In the article "Why Are My Dreams So Vivid Right Now?" in the April 2, 2020, issue of The Cut, writer Alice Robb interviews psychologist Deirdre Barrett who says, "“Changing one’s routine dramatically often leads to more dream recall.”

View from a window of the Peninsula Manila

Insomniac photographing her own image

I don't think I have to lie on a psychiatrist's couch or consult a psychologist to interpret my own dream. I know the house stands for myself, secure in the thought of a floor (groundedness?) and ceiling (brains? thoughts? literally higher self?) to shelter my body and soul, but open everywhere--perhaps I bare myself too much, huh? Being carried off by a twister is the opposite of being locked down and imprisoned in one's abode so there I am, unexpectedly freed from prison.

I call on a higher being, an intercessor to be my safety net. And indeed, someone familiar appears--Mommy--and she puts my house, myself down on our backyard, amongst the fruit-bearing trees.