Should you marry again?

I’m not saying don’t do it. I’m just saying prepare yourself for this adjustment. It is not easy but we can do it.

Is there a difference between being married a second time and staying single? First, there’s the obvious — your sleeping habits. You don’t sleep alone anymore. You sleep with a man who doesn’t snore but who sometimes talks in his sleep. He lets you know that you too talk in your sleep. So you wake up each other out of a fear of nightmares. That’s a good point for being married. It’s one of the points I am grateful for.

 Second, your eating habits. Now you have someone — not the TV set — to eat with. But when there’s something to talk about, you probably overstay at table. Other times you only say I-really-like-this or I’m-going-to-finish-my-rice-and-yours. Don’t be shocked. We get served very small portions. When I like the food, I eat my husband’s rice and mine. That’s about half-a-cup. Nevertheless I always eat more food than he does. He beats me hands down on desserts.

 Loy loves ice cream. He loves to create it in his head. Then we go to get extra creamy vanilla ice cream, cans of lychees, maraschino cherries and whatever new gimmick he imagines. Once he got carried away and bought canned blackberries.  He didn’t like the seeds. I like blackberries. I like eating the crunchy little seeds. So I took over. Little by little I am getting converted into liking some of his favorite desserts.

 There is one grey point. I call it a grey area because sometimes it happens and other times not but the times are not predictable. For example, two days ago he told me he saw in his phone that his cousin Miniang had passed away. He remembered her as a pretty young girl who came to live with them for a while when they were teenagers. Do you want to go to her wake? I asked. He did not answer. So I went back to making necklaces.

 In a little while he said that Mrs. Meding Rodrigo had passed away. Do you want to go to her wake? I asked again. Once again he did not reply. So once again I went back to my necklaces. That is my policy. I ask the question once. If he doesn’t want to answer, I know nothing will happen. But if he suddenly says something, then that will happen.

Yesterday afternoon he said we were going to the two wakes. Marrielle, his oldest and most dutiful daughter, would come with us. So off we went.

 Mrs. Rodrigo I met a long time ago when I was a teenager attending jam sessions at their place. But we never really had a conversation. I was friends, closer to the gang mates of her sons Milo and Boogie, who introduced me then to their sisters Ditas and Pempe, and brother King, with whom I now feel a sort of “relationship” because he and Boots Anson-Roa were married a little before Loy and I were and we are both roughly the same age. Together, I suspect, we extend some hope to other seniors. Yes, you might marry again one day.

 We also saw two of her grandchildren, Franco Sevilla, with whom I used to work at McCann-Erickson, and Tonito Sun, whom I had met through Loy. We ran into Raffy Evangelista, who is another old friend, whose daughter is a good friend of my daughter. There was Boy Guevarra, another high school gang mate, with his lovely wife whom I had met at our church in Wack-Wack. This was a bunch of old friends who knew Loy and me, and accepted me as his present wife.

 Then we went to Miniang’s wake. Her full name is Wilhelmina Ang Singh, we found out. Apparently Loy did not know her family well. He introduced me as his wife now to Miniang’s husband, who seemed to have recognition problems. The lady who stood up to greet Loy apparently was Miniang’s second daughter. She called two more sisters of hers and one of her nieces. They got involved in family talk. Of course, that did not include me. Marrielle could talk to them but I didn’t know what to say so I just smiled and said nothing except good-bye and thank you. That I consider a grey area. Grey is sometimes an uncomfortable color to be in because you don’t feel accepted as the present wife. You feel like a stranger in their midst.

 But you must also learn to accept that because you are new and it takes time for others to accept you and for you to accept that you are new. It’s part of the major adjustment process. So I write about this just in case I have readers who expect to marry for the second time. I’m not saying don’t do it. I’m just saying prepare yourself for this adjustment. It is not easy but we can do it. All we need is time.

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