baby is moving vigorously. i feel him/her moving everyday and it makes me so happy. just knowing that he or she is there makes me stop whatever i am doing and marvel at the miracle that is growing inside me. i get scared too. i know how much responsibilities there are once you have a child and sometimes i get overwhelmed by the magnitude of it all. questions race in my mind: would i be a good parent? would i be able to provide for all his/her needs? would he/she love me the way i already love him/her?

i'm scheduled for an ultrasound scan next month. i'm hoping we'll be able to see if it's a he or a she. i don't want to keep buying yellow stuff for our baby. i feel oddly drawn to pink and frilly stuff though. is this a sign? or just wishful thinking?

this is a picture i got of a fetus at five months.

- Your baby will begin sensing sounds inside and outside the womb, like the beating of your heart or the sound of your voice.
- You may feel quickening, the first flutters of your baby's movements.
- Your baby will suck her thumb and get the hiccups.
- By the end of the month she'll develop fatty tissue and weigh about one pound. (www.expectalipil.com)

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i do realize that my blog's new title is the largest irony in the world. as the saying goes, the only things that are certain in life are death and taxes. (cue dreamy image of brad pitt licking a spoon of peanut butter in meet joe black...sorry).

so joks and i attended my lolo's funeral yesterday. we had wanted to get up early, have breakfast and travel the two hours to my grandparents' home in bulacan. however, as we had put in a very late night (3 a.m. to be exact), we woke up an hour after we had intended to do so. we had breakfast in the neigborhood mcdonald's. it's been a long time since i had one of their sausage mcmuffins and hash browns -- it's one of life's simple pleasures, mine at least and i really thought i deserved it for the day ahead.

well as soon as joks and i sat down to eat, this guy came uncomfortably close to me, put down a large plastic bag beside my seat and handed me a small laminated card. the card asked me to buy a package of dried mangoes for 50 pesos or three for 130 to support the guy's education. i said no and handed him back the card not because i was not feeling particularly charitable but because one, i have four packages of dried mangoes at home that joks brought back from cebu, and two, i believe in choosing my charities. besides, 50 pesos is too much for a small package of dried mangoes. joks bought his pasalubong for me for 28 pesos. i like dried mangoes but i'm not that crazy about them that i'm willing to pay more than half the price for some more fruit preserves.

i would not have thought twice about the incident if it weren't for the events following that. joks and i boarded the taxi that would take us to the bus terminal in cubao. as joks and i were talking throughout the short and breezy ride, we did not notice how much the speedy commute was costing us, kilometer by kilometer. we were surprised therefore, when we reached our destination to find that our fare came up to 102.50. i had a sneaking suspicion we were being ripped off but did not want to start the day with an argument, considering what i would be facing in a few hours so i shrugged it off.

imagine my annoyance when, while waiting for the bus to roll off the terminal, a teenaged girl handed me a familiar plastic-laminated card, similar to the one i saw earlier but bearing a different name. i wonder why they picked dried mangoes as a product. and i wonder why they picked me. do i have sucker written all over my face? that had to be a racket right there. the world is filled with evil people, after all. dah.

so on to the funeral. while waiting for the coffin to be taken to the nearby chapel, i realized that it was going to be my third funeral for the year. i think i've had my fair share for at least ten years, but you never know. death is certain after all. i know i have to stop being so morbid but i just can't help it. blame it on recent events, exhaustion, and borderline depression. but just not on me. so there.

i see i am reverting to the language of a deranged teenager. so god help me.

well then, on to the show. seeing as any occassion is as good as any, my uncle who is also my godfather and my only surviving senior male paternal relative brought me out to the ancestral home's backyard, right by the river. we had The Talk. he asked me about joks, whether we were actually married and when i said yes he asked what my plans are so i was like, for what? the long and short of it is that he "recommends" (his word, not mine) that we get married again in church for the sake of my lola. take note, he said for my lola, and not for me. he said it is the moral thing to do. (i flashback to father dacanay in theology class, and immediately shake it off.)

i could not help but cry in front of him -- for all the things i could not say, for all the things i did say. for a long time joks and i have done it our way, managing as best we could, maneouvering through life's most turbulent storms, and sharing in the joy that our love brings us. we have always done things our way, together. we knew what is best for us and have always acted according to our dreams and our plans.

we have decided long ago that it is impractical for us to spend our hard-earned savings on a church wedding that would please all of my relatives but would leave us with a zero bank account. besides, we both knew no one in my side of the family wanted him for me. so we got married without any of my relatives knowing it. it was just easier that way. and now...our minds have not changed. we still felt that our money will be more wisely-spent if we saved it for our and our child's future. my uncle said that he's willing to help us. but i do not want that. i do not want our wedding to be forever indebted to them. what i want is for them to accept my decision, accept my choice, love whom i love, the way his family did to me. is that so hard to do? i am sure they have material things joks' family does not have but they are after all, human too.

"Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions? fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer, as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die?" - Shylock in Merchant of Venice, William Shakespeare

so sorry to be melodramatic. but i have always been a drama queen.

went to my doctor yesterday for my prenatal check-up. baby's heartbeat sounded stronger. and everything's going well with the pregnancy. yipee.

do you like my new template? i do. Ü

yesterday, at around noon, i got a message from my sister who told me she had been told that it will be lolo's last day on earth and we better come, and come quickly if we wanted to say goodbye.

tied up at work as i was, and with joks a million miles away, i could not help but feel discouraged. by the time i was able to grab a few hours away from work, it was already half past three. i got into a cab and was immediately confronted with the traffic on makati avenue. when i told the driver where to go he said, "traffic pa naman dun." annoyed beyond belief, i snapped, "my lolo is dying and i have to get there now."

undeterred, he replied, "matanda na ba?" i had to say yes. to this he commented with a smile, "matanda na pala eh. pwede na." i would have alighted from the cab with door hanging open right then and there if i was not in such a hurry. i did not need his smirk but i really needed a ride to the hospital. i considered the light traffic going to shaw boulevard as my small victory against The Evil Cabman.

even though my sister told me what room my lolo was transferred to, i guess i was not listening properly and i went to the wrong ward, st. jude. wards in this hospital are named after saints and i knew that the name st. jude did not mean well for those in that ward. i called my sister again and asked her what room they were in, confirming my suspicion that i was in the wrong hallway. as i walked out, i saw the hospital chaplain calmly walking towards me. i moved away and into my lolo's room.

what i saw broke my heart. i saw him when he was in intensive care and i knew it was only minutes before his time will come. not wanting to let my relatives see me cry, i rushed to the bathroom and wept. i then washed my face and tried to act as if i was not affected at all.

i sat beside my uncle who whispered, "judgment day na ni daddy."

then the chaplain i saw earlier came in to deliver my lolo's last rights and offer a few words for us. that's when i lost it. a few minutes after the chaplain left, with his words about life being temporary and surrendering to god's will still ringing in my ear, a nurse came in to check lolo's pulse and blood pressure. it took her a while and the respirator attached to my lolo kept emitting this annoying noise, an alarm of some sort.

the nurse finally left, and returned later with an ecg machine. all the while, my lola was hunched over lolo's face, saying over and over again, "jesus. jesus. jesus." i could not help but feel her pain. they have been married for more than half a century and i cannot imagine how difficult it is to lose someone you've been with for almost all your life. just thinking of losing joks tears my heart apart.

when the small slip of paper came out of the ecg machine, a single straight line was printed on it, pronouncing, for all the world to see, that my lolo has left his leaden body behind and went to meet his Master.

i thought how i did not get a chance to say goodbye but i realized that we had said goodbye to each other days ago when i first visited him in the emergency room of the hospital. when i came in, he recognized me and smiled. that was the last time i spoke to him, the very last time he saw me. i know i shall never forget it.

as one life is lost, another emerges, or so they say.

goodbye my love.
as i soar above unburdened by pain
and unshackled by fear,
trust that i love you still
and that our parting is only for a while.
we will meet again my love.
together
we will continue our journey where i am bound.
part from your sorrow
but not from our love,
keep that burning in your heart
and i will wait for you
until it is time.

- written just a few minutes after my lolo's death. sta.mesa, manila

on death. or rather, dying.

i received a call the weekend before last from my aunt in the province. i have not seen her in ages, the most recent text i got was several days before when she told me how sick my grandfather already is. and so it is with trepidation that i answered her call. i expected the worst and i got well, not the baddest of the bad, but close.

my lolo is in icu in a hospital near our home and i had to get there that very same day. i was experiencing somewhat painful and uncomfortable braxton-hicks contractions that day but i willed my uterus to be temporarily quiet for the time being.

good thing it obeyed my fervent plea. but that was the only good thing that day. i was fortunate enough (indeed, if you can call it that) to have arrived at the hospital when my lolo was still lucid and able to recognize me. when i got there, they were still in the er but when they wheeled him to his solitary room at the icu, he fell fast asleep and no amount of rousing from his visitors later that afternoon and evening woke him up.

he has been in intensive care for over a week and he shows no sign of improvement. just this afternoon i got a call from my uncle asking me if i could possibly visit tomorrow. i couldn't because of a shoot. they told me they were going to talk about a medical procedure that would not exactly save my lolo's life. my lola has given up, he said and is asking us to make a decision.

i wondered why i should have to participate in such a grim mission, if i am equipped at all. my faith tells me to trust His will, that there must be a reason he is still with us, that one must never play god. my religion has always been "thy will be done." i have learned through the years that trusting His will and leaving everything up to Him is best for me. who am i to contradict Him?

of course, i cannot discount exhaustion, whether it be financial, emotional and physical. i know how draining it is to be at the bedside of someone you love night and day. i can only imagine how my lola felt about seeing her partner of more than 60 years slowly shrinking smaller and smaller into the bedcovers. my lolo had been a handsome young man. his aristoctratic good looks and my lola's classic beauty, coupled with their romantic elopement was a fairy tale of sorts for me. i knew that their love was enduring, that they accepted each other without question from the time they said their vows until today.

now i am rambling. what i wanted to say is that on an intellectual level i can understand why she gave up. but, there is a but, in my mind and in my heart. what should i say to my uncle who is expecting me to call tomorrow and put in my two cents' worth?

do they really think that in my quarter of a century on this earth, i will be able to give an answer far wiser than any of them would? because i honestly don't.

on life, and living

oh what a weekend. for some weird reason, i became accident-prone starting saturday. minor burns, nothing to worry about but then, it's annoying.

and this morning i woke up with an earache and baby's rapid but slight movements in my tummy. s/he is moving now as i write this. maybe s/he knows i'm talking about her.

though i was able to eat a wonderful hungarian sausage breakfast (at dome cafe, php270), i was not able to eat lunch because i was just too darn busy. i am now wolfing down a cheese pizza from shakey's but life could be better.