2010

When I started 2009, I wrote a few friends this note:


Closures are good especially when the eagerness for new openings offers fresh hopes and perspectives and excitement and delight and wondrous anticipation of possibilities.

I am happy to have sealed my 2008 off, thankful even. It had been a toilsome year, and the wear and tear on my body, limb, mind, spirit is evidenced by sagging eyebags, 50 kilos of lean frame, thinning and receding hairline, and this tired look that validates the fact that i am nearing 50.

I received two gold medals in the academe for being the first among the dean’s listers and for being the most outstanding student. Honestly, I am not too very sure that I should be rejoicing in the glory. When I think about the playing field – all students and classmates not even a quarter as mature as I am – I feel that I am taking something from them. But just the same, I am grateful for the recognition.

I was awarded with five trophies for being the Best Investigative Journalist, Best Photo Portfolio, Photojournalist of the Year, Best in Creative Non-Fiction Writing, Best in Community Feature Writing, and was almost embarrassed every time my name was called and I had to make acceptance speeches.

When I defended my thesis about the perception of a local columnist on the presidency of Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, I was told that my work could very well earn me another award for Best Thesis next year. On top of these, I received 2 100% marks during the last two semesters.

On the family front, my parents were re-married on their 50th anniversary and I was just too overcome with joy as I watched them exchange their renewed vows – a dream come true especially for my mother who five years ago had a puzzling dizzy spell that made her asked God, verbally for everyone in the Seniors’ Camp to hear – that she wanted to live to reach her golden wedding anniversary. What an answered prayer!

I still have not gotten over the death of my brother Toto. That is something I have to live with on a day-to-day basis. This is one of the things I carried over from 2007 and have not put a closure on till today. I comfort myself in the fact that, yes, he is just somewhere having a grand time and it won’t take long before I see him again – no matter how foolish that might seem.

I published three books in a month from November 15 to December 14 – a feat that I did not imagine I could do. But it was perhaps spurned by a little bit of hurt and pain and anger when I was told my schooling has weakened the position of a very dear friend – a thing I tried to avoid from day one but caught up with me anyway in such an ironic fashion.

But I am happy to leave them all behind.

I am looking forward to 2009.

I am looking forward to graduating from college with a degree in Bachelor of Arts in Journalism. And hopefully – but unsurely – the top honors that go with it. I am profoundly grateful that even if graduation is still in the distance, I was already given an informal invitation announced on several occasions to teach at the Colegio.

I am looking forward to my first real big holiday in Europe next summer when I can be with friends and people who are important and dear to me. I am looking forward to flying to the United States also to visit the church in Los Angeles – yes, the one the Lord has helped me to start in 2007, and to provide company even for a short while to another dear friend in Chicago .

I am looking forward to planning my first business venture along with some friends – a chain of barber shops that will help hone whatever entrepreneurial skills I have in my bones.

I am looking forward to taking my time easy.

I am looking forward to living.

But life would not have been this wonderful and marvelous and remarkable and splendid without friends who make living worthwhile. I have become what I am and who I am, by the grace of God, and by the flame that friendships have brought into my life. Without these two factors, I would be merely existing.


Now that 2009 has likewise come to a close, there is no better way to go than to look back and give thanks to what were looked forward to in the preceding year that, by the grace of God, indeed, came into fruition. The hard three-and-a-half-year work has paid me off handsomely.

I am thankful that I graduated from Letran with a Bachelor of Arts in Journalism and the highest honor to boot – summa cum laude – which collected for me three gold medals at the commencement exercise in April. These brought to six the total of academic medals received from the Colegio.

Along with that, I received the Best Journalism Thesis – the one that tackled the presidency of Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo through the eyes of Manuel L. Quezon III’s “The Long View” column. There were also recognition for my team’s work on dissecting GMA Channel 7’s “24 Oras” which won for us the Best Policy Paper in Media Ethics; the Best Development Communication Plan for my group’s “Hopeful Homeless”; the Best Desktop Magazine for my publication team’s “Buhay Intramuros”. I also received another trophy for the Best Integrated Marketing Communication which credited my work on information dissemination for the promotion of a trimester at Letran. In all, I received a total of 13 Excellance trophies throughout my brief stay at the Colegio.

I failed to fly to the United States for lack of time, but I was able to travel to and spend one month in Europe. I visited my German friends – the Abeles – who took the time to take me around the north of Germany with a side-trip to Denmark and the Czech Republic. I was also able to attend Papa Herman and Mama Hanny Pruijt’s 50th wedding anniversary in Holland. Looking back, I could not have imagined that after 9 years, it would have been possible for me to come to Europe again. But as many things that had been afforded me in the past, I have always believed that one has to want something so bad to make it really happen. I believed. I received.

When I had my KIA Pride in 2003, I acknowledged that this cute little white car was God’s gift and vowed never to trade it for anything. I have always been in love with smaller cars, how easy to drive them, how slick, efficient and practical in a traffic-laden metropolis. But after two electrical short-circuits while driving startled and traumatized me, I always had trepidations every time I ignite the machine. Slowly, I distanced myself from driving and went on to wistfully ache for a new car. I remember muttering under my breath: I will only drive again if I have a new car to run around in.

On October 13, I received this wonderful gift: a 2010 gray Toyota Avanza which in three weeks time became registered to my name with the plate number NBI 619. What an amazing dream-come-true. More than two months later, I still have not breached the 3,000 kilometers mark, and driving has regained its important place in my day-to-day routine. Though apprehensive at first because driving takes away a lot of nitty-gritty things I can do if I was commuting, I am now beginning to look forward being behind the steering wheel as it allows me to have some precious quiet moments with my Father, and revel in the selection of eclectic music I play in the car that relaxes my nerves. Bliss!

And finally, just as I thought I’d be running out of things to thank God for in 2009, I suddenly turned 50! With a few friends to help me celebrate my golden year anniversary on December 16, I let loose my Scrooge instinct and went on to spend a good deal of my Christmas bonus to sip wine, have good food, trade hello’s, and listen to retro music as this looked-forward-to calendar event unfolded.

I am 50, this is 2010, and I am beginning to count my blessings.