My life now

It is August, almost the end of the month. To the Chinese, August is the month of ghosts, sort of like our November. Three-fourths of 2009 is almost over. August is my birthday month. Last year it came in with a bang. My birthday is 08.08, and last year — 08.08.08 when I turned 64, which is 8x8 — last year I had a profusion of 8s, for me, a very lucky number. It even has a Beatles song: “Will you still need me, will you still feed me, when I’m 64?” So last year I had a big celebration but this year, just quiet lunches with my children and a few friends.

This year, when I have time, I am somewhat depressed. Sixty-five! If I were still working, I would be forced to retire now. That means I have really stepped into the realm of the old. Maybe it is fear of this that made me resign eight years ago but wait — was that number the magical eight?

Now I wake up on Mondays and Thursdays and dress in khaki pants, closed shoes (I absolutely hate them, they don’t get along with my toe structure), school blazer and march off to Enderun Colleges where I teach two subjects to college undergraduates the age of my grandchildren. They frustrate me sometimes but other times they make me feel young again. One of them told me I look 24 and I all but called him a liar, though I thought he was so sweet. Imagine, to tell an old lady of 65 that she looks 24. He made me feel good.

On Mondays I leave school at 1 p.m. and come home to prepare my own lunch. Then I have a little free time until around 4:30 when I have to get ready for another class I have at 5:30 to 8 p.m. This one is an older class, but still younger than me. I think they are Gen-Xs, while my morning students are Gen-Ys.

Tuesday is my day for my writing client, with whom I have lunch, then I have my weekly massage, which ends at 4 p.m. At 7:30 p.m. I go off to my dancing classes at Studio 116. I graduated from the first class to a salsa and swing class, just to get my feet moving. I’m getting quite good, can do the turns and the basics, but I get dizzy after a while. This happens on Tuesdays and Thursdays. On Wednesdays I have another day to myself to catch up with schoolwork, but at night I have another class with the Gen-Xs. Home at 8:30 again. On Fridays I visit my mother, whose Alzheimer is getting worse. It is a degenerative disease, meaning it gets worse every day.

I have developed an attitude of amusement towards visiting her home. I’ve gotten somewhat involved in the fun part of their lives. I watch the lady who wants to escape, the one who curses crisply all day, the one who mutters over some grief. I watch the man who rolls paper, the other one who sings. It lightens the visit somehow.

Then I have a group of new friends, all of them men, with whom I have lunch almost every Friday. The friendships are still fresh and in the realm of discovery, but I like it because it gives me something new to do. Friday is my free day when I can do anything I want. Saturday I am at Lily Pad, the restaurant in my Calamba home, and Sunday I am at the Legazpi Market. Sometimes I go back to Calamba after market day to join my partner Tina for dinner with her friends. Lily Pad is beautiful in the evening. The pond is lovely now, with more running water and gorgeous, fragrant big lotuses.

Do you think my life is empty now? No, it is so full. So full I have no time to fix my house, something I have to do because next Friday my best friend from grade school through high school is coming to town and will live with me for two days. I am so excited to see her. We are both only children and we grew up like sisters. I am really looking forward to that.

What do I do in my free time? I write this column. Then I make anting-anting necklaces to sell at the market. Anting-antings are truly Filipino, old Filipino, our protest to Spanish colonization, which used religion as their colonizing weapon. Early Filipinos decided to take their imagery because it was prettier than ours then, but imbued it with our own meanings. There are angels to make women more attractive to men. Saints to make us superior to our peers. I string them into modern necklaces hoping that today’s Filipinas will awaken and say, “I will wear one of those because I am Filipina.” We have to learn to be proud of what we are.

So do I have spare time? Very little because at night I am tired and fall asleep and dream of a young man I once loved. I don’t know why. I think he just symbolizes the young men who surround me now — my students, my dance instructors, everyone around me is young and fun. Everyone makes me forget about being 65.

That’s my life now. How it has changed!

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