Secret No More

I have always been apprehensive and reluctant to show doodles and other creative efforts to my family. When my first article was published in my high school paper, an aunt who was an English teacher questioned me endlessly why I didn’t show her my draft. Truth be told, I was afraid of being critiqued by a bunch of aunts, uncles, cousins not to mention my mean sister and brothers. Growing up in a family where people are not shy to express their opinions, it was scary for a 14-year old wannabe-writer to flaunt her efforts at a merciless mob of quipsters.

Imagine yourself rehearsing a declamation piece on top of the dining table with a dozen relatives as your critic, judge and jury. By the time I was 13 I would sneak into the bathroom and lock the door to practice in front of the mirror instead of enduring an afternoon of ruthless coaching from my aunts.

I never flinch when other people criticize me, I had lots of practice at home---I either take it constructively or with a grain of salt. But it’s always difficult to swallow when rebuked by loved ones. Thankfully, I am getting a bit braver and tougher as I age. An aunt now living in Florida sent this email after reading my ‘Miranda’ blog page…

Dearest Luna,

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to read your blogs. While your Tito Dodong was reading to me, I felt like going back to being a child, having fun with everything around me most especially with important people whose principle and conviction I have imbibed, have lived with and never regretted it for one moment. I pray that I can go on living up to their expectation through the last remaining years of my life. To you and me they are immortal and create a kind of feeling of very personal grandeur.

Miranda is very special to us. It is magical. Places are made up of people, and they are those that make happiness real, cause our people are real people, incomparable, compelling and they are alive in you and me and in every generation to come.

When I get so sad I readily accept loneliness. I let my spirit travel to Miranda with my Nanay, and be grateful for having been born, and spent the life I have had, and begin to start living again. I have always believed that we are trained and expected to rise every time we fall. It is in our nature, and that is what we are.

Luna, I will always treasure your e-mails, but this is the best! You gave me a glimpse to peep into your innermost soul. Let us altogether make Miranda come alive. Hopefully we can come to have a place like that with all the dear people and with the help of GOD.

Please give my love and prayers to the family.

Much love from us,
Tito Dodong and Tita Rosie

I actually cried after reading Tita Rosie’s email…well, I’m such a crybaby anyway. But I’m glad that I’ve somewhat overcome being diffident towards my family. Oh well, we're definitely getting better as we get older.

The family. We were a strange little band of characters trudging through life sharing diseases and toothpaste, coveting one another's desserts, hiding shampoo, borrowing money, locking each other out of our rooms, inflicting pain and kissing to heal it in the same instant, loving, laughing, defending, and trying to figure out the common thread that bound us all together.

~Erma Bombeck