CROSSROADS

Fear and anxiety are real.

So, how does faith happen in the midst of all these? While it is true that God was and is in control, it is still an uphill climb to be right in the middle of a fix. I wouldn't be surprised if the Israelites grumbled at Moses and indirectly to God to the point of causing Moses to strike a rock twice when he was clearly told to only speak to it and bingo, the answer to faith would come spurting. Well, despite the failure of execution, water did come out. As to obedience, that's another question. The important thing is, faith works. Neither should I be stunned by Moses for blowing his top. One thing is sure, faith is tough. The difficulties are harsh.

The stark difficulties become even harsher after the I do's and after the first cry of the first baby. All the more reason that the singles should not be too itchy to jump into this quagmire called marriage. I do not intend to sound regretful or nostalgic of the things past. It's just that it is true what many say, "Reality bites." In fact, reality grabs you unawares and devours you sapping all your energy at crucial times.

And crucial time is now.

While I like this dainty, expensive project in front of me, presented to me by my student from an affluent family in this institution of affluent kids, I could not help contrast this high-priced creation made of costly materials what my humble home suffers from as of this moment. Nahh, we still have food in the table, water in the fridge and enough clothing to cover us which is generally not bad. But looking closely to bills and debts in tow, all these basic things may just disappear few weeks from now.

Tomorrow, I would not know where to get money to pay these bills and carry-over debts from the time when I delivered my baby. At the time I was practically jobless. I would have had not much of this problem if I decided not to get pregnant and have Shekinah. But the choice I made will be the same choice given another tummy-bulging nine months--same excruciating labor pains, same debts, same nostril-expanding Shekinah cry.

So, here, this little woman is at crossroads again: leave this present work and go back to the public where future benefits lie (but wait when to get hired which would perhaps take months, months of fasting and famine) or stay in this private institution and be assured of a job next year. This is probably the time when faith comes to play--huh, easier said than done, all right. I tell you, this is scary.

At times, I don't think about it. Why? I don't want to wrestle with my own doubts. It's bloody.

But I have no choice. Pretty soon, I will have to face all these.

Maybe, tonight.

A STAUNCH GRIP

I don't know about tomorrow;
I just live from day to day.
I don't borrow from its sunshine
For its skies may turn to grey.
I don't worry o'er the future,
For I know what Jesus said.
And today I'll walk beside Him,
For He knows what is ahead.

Many things about tomorrow
I don't seem to understand
But I know who holds tomorrow
And I know who holds my hand.



If songs with a tinge of sad melody would qualify for a wedding song, the old Gospel song of faith above should top my list of wedding songs three years back. This would have sent my sponsors with doctoral degrees in their crisp barong and gowns perouetting to the altar (such reminds me of the youtube episode of maids of honors and sponsors dancing out of whack to the music while going to the altar with groom and bride strutting their litheness in front of the minister). Or so I thought. Such innovation, I mean, such bizaare choice of song might send their eyebrows to Neverland.

A wedding is a wedding. So as they say, the dainty look of the bride and her hordes of flowers in the church will be forever remembered by her generation and the next. But see, shouldn't such song be logically fitting to how a wife and husband should see a third-world future together? For all they know, they will not only need to hang on to each other's hand but a staunch, solid grip together on the Savior's hand most importantly.

GEISHA ON THE WALL

Today

She faces the wall

Laced with tiers

Of mingling litanies:

Morning murmurs,

Smoke-drenched throaty cries,

Salty cold drops.


The wall is hers,

A mirror where she wipes

The blanched geisha aside

And picks up the faint

Traces again

Of that pale

Brown silhouette

By the old morning crib.

HEALING OF AN INFAMOUS NAG

A promise is a promise. It is supposed to be as easy as that. I could only wish. What's tough to take really is when you make a promise with a loved one in the presence of God and fall short in keeping it. At the time that you suspect you might just break it, all hell let loose and it happens. No matter how hard you try not to. It just happens. Right there. In front of the man you married.


I simply promised not to nag on him on small stuff a woman thinks a husband should or should not do on a Sunday.


So how does a wife with an electric drill (of sort) of a mouth deal with that? I wish I could just look up to the clouds, call on one of God's trusted angels and help me deal with my furious husband. I knew our Sunday morning was screwed up already. We would be late to church.

Our one-year-old Kiny was bewildered at the collition of galaxies. Her wide-eyed look stopped me short of my litanies. This couldn't continue. So, against my usual noisy nature, I went silent for the longest time--one whole hour or so.

I knew the whole time, I was guilty. I just lay down beside my anger-stricken husband and whispered my apology. As expected I was crying. I tried not to. But being a cry-baby, there I was. And there, my husband took my apology. I knew he would. He tried to hide a smile of delight and relief in his eyes, tried to be mean and quiet. Then he took me in his arms, hid me there for a brief moment. Just that, and I got healed. We got healed.

SCREWING WITH THE HORMONES

It went on a blur. So it seemed. Because right now, I am still smoking and spewing hot lavas. I never wanted to spew rusty slimy vile preaching on any kid, no matter how depraved he becomes. Neither do I wish to send these kids to the judgment hall--the headmaster's office--the most dreaded place to be. They are just kids, victims of their own boredom and their own manufactured vulnerable world.

But yesterday, screw them all! All the sinking sand in a desert can devour them and vomit them off to the deepest sea where either Scylla or Charybdis could jauntily nibble on them. For days, I let go. For days, they thought they could do away with murder unscathed. But they screwed up on one important day--Mock NAT examination day, yes, but no, yesterday was more crucial than that. I had a terrible dysmenorrhea yesterday. And anyone who messes with me when my brain is water-logged and my hormones are all over the place loosening all my tightly capped acrid fumes, can better find a formidable rampart to shelter them. They can call their filthy rich parents and body guards. They can come in hordes and droves. They can kill me, right there and then. It's my word against their foul-smelling lies.

All teachers have been through a lot of distressing rounds with them. And each time, these kids would just shake the dust off and go on with another series of bouts later on. Perhaps my encounter with their viles yesterday might just be one that would soon be forgotten by these sons of their fathers, so to speak, it does not matter. So long as very soon they will face the judge.

They will wallow in the consequences, while I watch them grinding their teeth.

AFTER ONE PITCH BLACK MORNING

God indeed listens. Yesterday, I was typing down my fears and implorations. My husband announced that he's about to lose a few weeks of work since the company has suspended general work. Our daughter is sick and the medicine cabinet is running empty soon. I was thinking God must have punished me through my loved ones for missing something I promised him. I almost literally lay prostrate to the floor while writing. My eyes were welling up in remorse. I plead, "Lord, please not my family. Punish me. You can yank me down this mud hole, just not them."

Expecting more blues to even worsen the day, my husband told me work materials are to arrive today, hence, work would no longer be suspended. While I was remarkably composed receiving the best "swell" news, my insides were in knots in pleasant disbelief, dispelling all the pitch blackness hanging on my head the entire morning. I was thunderstruck, needless to say. Until now, God remains the God of surprises.

In the most desparate prayer, when the only option is down the pit, you suddenly find yourself looking down the pit where you were.

He does listen.

MUD HOLE

How does one get out of a mud hole? There is a point in a man's life that he gets squeezed up by two formidable forces that either he dies squeezed or he hurts one of the two forces because there is just no option. And I chose the only friendly option available. But no matter how I tried, I felt bad, because in so doing I had hurt the promise I made to my God and it felt so bad. I felt being punished and suffering is not an option.

So how does one get out of a mud hole? I still do not know. What I know is that I'm willingly going through the process--kinda like allowing myself the punishment and holding on to God's mercy for later on, I know, this will come to pass in due time. Yes, in God's time, the climbing will begin.