Mom would have turned 95 yesterday. She died young, at 45, from breast cancer. I’d rather remember the good days than dwell on how strict she was.
She graduated with an Education degree, major in English, minor in Music, from UP Diliman. During martial law, she insisted we study there too, much to the horror of my titos and titas in Manila. Besides English, she taught Speech classes, which is probably why English became our first language.
Growing up in Cebu, I found it strange that my parents spoke Tagalog to each other but only English to us. It was like they had a secret language of their own. I didn’t speak Tagalog or Cebuano fluently until I moved to Manila for college.
Our love of music came from her. We took piano lessons from her old teacher, Pilar Sala. I loved the nights she played Chopin or sang in her soprano voice. I still keep her Polonaise on my Spotify playlist, so I can play it whenever I want to remember her.
I was always in awe of her beauty, especially when she dressed up for a party. Even on ordinary days, she came to breakfast fashionably chic, hair neatly coiffed, lipstick red. Sometimes I catch myself at breakfast in my lingerie and wonder if she’d judge me for it.
Her last words to me, from a phone booth call just days before she died, were “let’s go shopping,” as if she were already planning her next visit to Manila.
Mommy put me in charge of cleaning the floors, making sure they were spic and span. I still keep that routine every day. I can’t stand a dirty floor.
She wasn’t a perfect mother, and I carried some of her bad parenting into how I raised my own children. I wanted to be better than her. I tried. Most days I failed. But today, I just want to remember her good side: nurturing, playful, funny.
Happy birthday, Mommy. Wherever you are, I hope there’s Chopin playing, and I hope you’re finally getting that shopping trip.
