Remember the time when….

Remember the time when you weren’t feeling so pretty and could just step out and have a facial, get a trim or have your nails done. Remember the days when you actually had a long hard week at the office and all you could dream of was having a massage at home or getting a “spa treatment”? If you’ve really been a law-abiding citizen who stayed home and kept yourself socially distant, then chances are if you’re past 50 you might be one of those whose white hair has betrayed your age, right? You have my sympathy. Our vanity and search for comfort have now become our worst enemy under lockdown. Yes, COVID-19 has been a raw deal for the beauty conscious people around us.

But before we all become sorry for ourselves, do take note that many of those who gave you so much comfort and self-confidence in the looks department are now in need of comfort and reassurance, and you would be just the person who can now give comfort and give back. We’ve all been inwardly focused about our situation under lockdown to the point that many of us have almost turned into mental introverts practically blocking out everything beyond our walls and doors. But out there, sitting forlorn and depressed are thousands of unemployed, out of work, no income individuals because of the COVID-19 quarantine. I know of several who won’t admit it but they have gone into depression, crying privately so their kids won’t see or hear them. They instinctively tell you “OK lang” but they are not because it has always been considered in bad taste if not weakness to tell people you are flat broke, frightened and depressed. There are couples who are both massage therapists, mine was the only breadwinner in the family supporting her husband, two kids and mother-in-law.

I’m not referring only to people doing beauty and wellness work for you. Think of the daily wage earners who service your car, your garden, the dog groomer, even your domestic helpers past and present because many of them served you and can now use some help from you. Just to add a spiritual context to this, allow me to share with you what Jesus Christ said would happen to those of you who extend blessings and compassion to those in need:

“Then the king will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father. Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me, naked and you clothed me, ill and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me. Then the righteous will answer him and say, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? When did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? When did we see you ill or in prison, and visit you?’ And the king will say to them in reply, ‘Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me.’ – Matthew 25:34 - 40

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It defies logic and law but as the great French philosopher Blaise Pascal wrote: “The heart has reasons that reason cannot understand.” I refer to the fact that a number of high ranking officials one in England and two in the Philippines have all defied reason and law simply because their wives were ill or going to the hospital.

The first to do so was Senator Koko Pimentel who came under fire and is now being investigated for breach of the COVID-19 safety protocols when he accompanied his pregnant wife to the hospital. The second case I heard about involved Dominic Cummings, a political strategist and chief aide of UK’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson. Cummings came under extreme fire for driving 260 miles outside of London to arrange child care. Boris Johnson defended his chief aide by saying:

“I have had extensive face-to-face conversations with Dominic Cummings and I have concluded that in travelling to find the right kind of childcare, at the moment when both he and his wife were about to be incapacitated by coronavirus – and when he had no alternative – I think he followed the instincts of every father and every parent,” Johnson said. “And I do not mark him down for that.”

After a couple of weeks of intense criticism and calls for resignation, it became clear that the official had followed a plan and observed necessary health protocols. People eventually let go of their anger and accepted that no amount of judgment would have stopped a father’s grave concern at a time when your wife is sick, he could be sick and the child needed to be placed in safety.

The latest of these stories recently hit the news after a five-vehicle convoy reportedly ignored a checkpoint somewhere approaching Baguio City. The incident drew the ire of Baguio City Mayor Benjamin Magalong as well as a number of netizens who immediately labeled the incident as a high-handed abuse of power. But as it turned out, the only ones who acted high-handed or ignored local authorities at the checkpoint were police officers serving as security escorts of Mayor Francis  Zamora.

The incident quickly died down after explanations were made and after it became public that Mayor Zamora had gone to Baguio to bring his wife to rest in the family home because she was recovering from treatment of her stage 3 breast cancer. That is love and needs no reasons, just understanding.

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