WHO SAYS RAISING KIDS IS MUCH OF A HELL-RAISER?

There are hard lessons in life that we don't get lectures for from our parents. More often than not, these come in the form of on-the-spot workshops. So that if we fail to measure up, we're screwed for life. But God's goodness is incomparable. When our finite comprehension has become too limited to see through things, His heart wills that we could handle the seemingly insurmountable hurdles.


Raising a human being with a completely different will (although of the same gene pool) and emotional make-up for instance is an everyday scary but pleasurable workshop. It's not like changing diapers and bathing a fluffy little creature where you miss a few hemline details but you somehow get it perfect the next try. Raising kids, needless to say, is a little bit more challenging than that. Moreover, there are actual times where being a parent takes a backseat with work demands hounding me. And in these times, it's easier to get rid of the little bugger by hitting her butt or worse, by shouting at her for shuffling your office papers and cramping your work table. It's so quick to forget that kids need us to be their parents on an every-minute basis.

I only have one kid but I'm juggling my schedule with family and work poorly. My mother did not get to have the chance to discuss or show me techniques how to deal with these little creatures even before I get to have them for nine months. We are 7 so that didn't help my having them inside for nine months, which to me was an achievement of sort. What with the change of hormones, temperament and of body sizes and everything. And when you thought you got rid of them already when the first cry came out, you find out another episode of parenting is just starting.

Ahh, parenthood. It brings a different facet in my otherwise boring days. I don't know why I still want more of them, I mean mothering more children than my uterus could handle. But seeing a human grow into someone you have helped him to become is euphoria for me. Well, of course, blame it on the big family I come from. I remembered when I fled from home due to a mother-daughter exchange of not-so-pleasant breaths. I cried most of the three months I was away from the usual noise of my nephews and nieces. It was plainly not home for me when the house is void of children's rustles. But then again,raising kids is actually complicated. And it takes grit and tremendous wise understanding of a human raw tendencies that become evident in a kid's early formative years. Patience, as well, is hard to come by. In a world where a woman is charged with so many roles and expectations, everyday at home is an uphill climb.

But in all these, I still want more. I love taking risk when it comes to children and young lives. That's part of the reason why I always find myself going back to teaching. At this point in my life, though a little bit late, I have come home to this: Kids and seeing them grow up is life to me. I'll move heaven and earth to live above water if I had to wade through with children tugging at my hands.

A WOMAN’S ORDEAL

A woman is another woman’s sister. But the story that follows is not just another woman’s ordeal. It’s my half-sister and best friend’s predicament. Hence, her heart struggles are much like mine as well.

I guess bit by bit I’m beginning to find some sense of problems in relationships like that of mine and my sister’s. I detest the idea that difficulties and unspeakable down times surface as a curse or punishment of sinful acts in the past. Whether this is a biblical truth or not, my gut tells me there’s no reason why people, whether believers or not quite, have to suffer because they need to be punished. I say it’s for the better. It is either there to wake us up to a certain realization or to strengthen our immune system for what challenges are up ahead in terms of relationship. I’d like to focus on the latter. I and my sister have been friends. We do not talk everyday but we have each other when it is tough out there.

We used to share a room in one bed when we were single. It wasn’t much of a bed. It was meant for one but since our parents could not afford another one, we (or more appropriately, I should say, my sister had to endure my presence every night in that rocking small space) content ourselves in that borrowed bed. Yes, it was borrowed from my old church friend. I would say I am the more vocal or should I say noisier about my emotions than she was. That explains why I couldn’t confront her about her personal life up front. I choose not to barge in to her shielded world to insist what’s best for her. I respect her private emotions. I love her that much that I hallow her silence. Although oftentimes, in the middle of her drowsiness when her waking moments were gradually slipping away, I get to blabber the many trivial events in my life. And she, being the most frank of all women that I know of, would smack to my face her irritation, hence, my self-imposed silence.

Lately, though, just when I’m exiling away from the family, so to speak, she came to me for the first time and spilled all her guts out about what is truly going on with her and her husband. For eight years, it is only her close friend who knew about what’s slowly eating her alive. For eight years, I tried to believe everything was all right with her—that she can handle being the only one to carry the cudgel when it comes to providing financially. However, her predicament is worse than who provides who. In fact, worse than what she already knows as a root of it all—her husband’s lack of sense of responsibility and maturity—it’s how she is emotionally and psychologically abused, making her feel useless and worthless as a partner, even as a mother.

Of course, I could not help being biased. Had I the prerogatives, I would have her shoo her man away from the house, which is technically her house anyway. I have my reasons—very private ones, that even thinking about them would seem to be a curse to a woman’s existence. Other than that, the woman that is hurt and mangled badly is my sister, one who has produced 4 very charming and intelligent children. And what’s heart-breaking is when my sister told me he even doubted that her 7-month-old baby was his. Now that simmered my usual cool self. Enough of too much respect of someone else’s married life, I finally mustered the courage to finally demand, “Let him go.”

Now, I didn’t know how she took that from her elder sister which she used to bully with her uncensored comments before. But that night, I could sense that it only took that comment to give her that signal from her family to move on without the man she used to call her husband.

My sister has been living like a headless woman swallowing all the embarrassments this man has been causing her. I wouldn’t say I hate him. I’d say he’s not worth a woman’s emotion.

The only thing that concerns me now is for my sister to find her peace and perhaps come back, no matter how slow, to the church one of these days.

A WOMAN’S MUSTS

Must a woman hurl
All of herself,
Be measured
But found half-full?

Can’t she hand in
A piece of her territory
And content
The world?

Should she hold on
To a man’s sleeves
Or hide behind
A man’s clothing
To ride the world?

Must her soul
Take a man’s voice
To be heard,
Or must her sinews
Mesh with those of
A man’s to gird
Herself against
The wiles of her days?

Yet
Wasn’t it a woman
Who shaved a man’s head
To his death
And more?

Was it not a woman
Who sang
A familiar lullaby
As the prince of Heaven
Spent thirty-three moons
In her arms
Just to rock the dying world
On its way
To paradise’s portal?

SUGILANON ILAWOM SA NAAWOP NGA BUWAN

Niabot na diay unta ka
Wa man gud ko
Makaalinggat.

Dugay na ra
Ba unta
Kong nag-atang
Sa imong
Awit
Nga ako unyang
Laylayon.

Basin tungod
Pino ang mga
Dahunog
Sa imong mga
Gamiting nga mga
Tiil--
Aw, mga tiil na
Ba kaha kadtong
Nagtuhil-tuhil
Sa akong
Kinasuluran?

Kung mahimo
Unta gitambid
Ko na dayon ikaw
Sa tunga-tunga sa kangitngit
Ug kadanlog
Sa imong kalibutan
Aron dinhi ikaw
Magpabilin.


Unta,
Wa ka nadakin-as
Ug mubiya
Sa akong
Giandam nga
Balay-balay
Sa dugay nang
Panahon.


Miawas,
Miikyas ang
Imong gininhawa
Palayo sa akong
Gininhawaan;
Wa gani nako
Masawo
Arun sapnayon
Ug itisok pagbalik
Ug alimahon.

Wa ko man lang
Mahapyod
Ug mahalok-halokan
Ang wala pa gani
Mahulma mong
Mga aping.


Unta
Mitidlom
Ka pa ug dugay-dugay
Sa sulod
Ning namugnaw
Nga balay-balay
Aron
Ikaw suginlan
Sa mga parayeg
Ug uraray ni
Cinderella ug
Snowhite sa ilang
Mga prinsipe
Aron ikaw mahinanok
Pa gyud hangtod sa
Pagsubang
Sa ika-syam ka
Bulan;

Anak,
Saari ko,
Mubalik ka
Aron maminaw
Sa pagluray
Sa akong tingog.


Sa sunod nga
Pagsubang sa
Akong bulan.

OF ITCHES AND WAITING

This whole idea of waiting, moreover than not, does not always present itself at a time when we're at our jolliest to stay put, linger a little longer, and extend our palms open for something good to drop from up there.

There are times when my hands get too itchy to write another set of poems in this blog and yet nothing comes off. While there are times when a thought just appears so clearly that the only thing I need is either a pen or a paper to get all the bleeding taken care of. Right now, there is no such bleeding. I have so much to write about but I just could not find the exact combinations of letters, words, or lines just to get the healing begin. You see, so long as I still keep whatever it is that I need to write, I feel some kind of nausea or a sickness of sort. Until I finally put this into writing, I remain brain dead or immobile in most of my functions, honestly. Ironically though, how am I supposed to start a line when, as I said I am deranged with the fullness of so many things, I can't even begin rightly? This is really insane.

And what better way perhaps to begin things appropriately than to stay silent for a short while. As for now, I am in awe of what's going on around me. So moved and so awed, I don't think a poem would contain what's eating me right now. Yes, even recognizing the whole idea that something is taking my focus away from what I usually do when I see a keyboard, would take seconds to download in the head that indeed something is up in the air and I just can't wait. Like I can't wait for weekends, for Christmas and for a trip to Iloilo every Christmas break. But this one has nothing to do with trips or vacations. This is way better.

And despite choosing silence, I desperately wait for the time when I can finally speak and frolic with my pen or better yet with any keyboard I could find just to get this itch go away. Finally.

RAPUNZEL AND THE JESUS ISSUE

I bought a new fairy tale video for my kiddo yesterday. And as expected Rapunzel becomes her fourth VIP this year. And til then, she has bugged me and my husband to play it again and again. Well, we've watched the movie with her yesterday and honestly, we were smitten by Disney's take on the plot. The usual meters of golden hair was there and the enlightened strong woman in Rapunzel's self was portrayed coupled with Disney-made charm of a singing voice. It was a good thing there wasn't much kissing in it, just a smack when the guy in the movie whom I thought was supposed to be a prince but is really a certified thief who dreamed of having a palace of his own (now that's an interesting take on the usual prince in a fairy tale rescuing a damsel in distress). I love the movie for my daughter minus the smack of a kiss which was readily imitated by my toddler right there when she saw it and the recipient victim of the sticky, slimy baby saliva was the poor loyal mother who's right beside the little Rapunzel, who later said, "Rapunzel's hair is long, Kiny's hair is short, see!"

Kids these days are tough to handle, believe me. You have to be around when they explore the world. They have to be oriented what's acceptable and what are detestable based on the Biblical standard. But the bad news for us is there would be instances where parents could not be there all the time to clear the coast for them.

But as always, I'm hoping that my daughter will ask her questions in time when she needs to and to the right persons. Well, we can only hope. But hey, I can also pray--pray that she will trust her father and me to have the right answers right when she needs them.

For instance, when she saw the be-mustached King, the father of Rapunzel, she blurted out, "It's Jesus, Mommy!" This wasn't a question all right. But I needed to explain to her that not all guys with mustaches are Jesus. For an innocent kid like her who is used to illustrated Bible stories that picture Jesus with a long hair and a mustache, every man with the hair is Jesus.

On one hand, I'd like to keep her that way where she sees every man as Jesus, the good man and the kind God. But as early as now, I feel she needs to know that there are not so good guys out there. It's nice to know though, that the only Jesus kids should see is us, their parents and the rest of the adults. That's what we should be. But the world has become harsh--so harsh because of people whom we thought is Jesus but are not.

CRYING TIME

Crying is freaking automatic these days. With all the hullabaloo at work and meetings and debate sessions with the kids at school, I cry in the inside seeing my family at the sideline waiting. I look at the stuff I'm supposed to finish down pat, it's still there lying helplessly on the dusty racks. At times, they seem to stare at me and say, "What are we doing here? Aren't we suppose to go somewhere else?"

My friend once told me, "To have peace, one has to return to his unfinished businesses and make a closure to each one of them, or else, he wouldn't know where to go and how." There must be some grain of truth in it. For with my unfinished book and project, I remain immobile when it comes to my career. At least that's how people see me from their vantage viewpoint. I would not try to argue with them nor would I offer any excuses with possible meta-analysis (which I am won't to do to defend my cause in a helpless fix I usually get in). Yes, the world I am in is a stress-laden world. I could go for a million stress-busters but still come out dehydrated for trying to survive. Teaching often does that to the real victims in the classroom--yes, the teachers. And because the government expects public slaves to send their students to the real world well-equipped we get whipped by demands making us give up priorities--in my case family and special personal projects.

It's a joy to teach. No doubt about it. I'd jump at it again and again. But I'm doubly sure that after all these head-cracking activities, if I don't do anything to replace the liquids that I lost, so to speak, I would die in the toxins I'm plunging right now. And worse, my family bond will suffer some cuts and bruises and it won't be long until it breaks.

So what do I do? What else? I spew liquids with sniffs here and there, hoping the coast will finally clear. But more than that, after the crying, I got to stand up and start making a plan like a real man that I should be, or should I say "woman" that I am.