1.11.11

Ten days ago, there were only three 1s standing erect on the title. Today, there are five. In another ten months time, there will be six. And unfortunately, there was nothing significant I did in celebration of the five 1s.

Well, there is, of course, my first BS at Merchant’s which, come to think of it, can also be counted as worthy of significance.

I spent the rest of the day being in the company of Norrie, he who has been a permanent fixture in and of my life since 1976. He still works in Yemen and has been overseas from 1984 when I recommended him to work at the Diwan of Royal Court Affairs in Oman. Now an English teacher, he remains adrift between coming home and settling overseas to a still undecided place.

I chided him, “Hanggang ngayon OFW ka pa rin,” and I wish I didn’t. It did sound a bit pompous and condescending. And I understand why he is being so ambivalent. The burden continues to be a burden even if he, like Ronnie and I, has advanced in years. How much longer? There lies the dilemma of every overseas worker. The supposedly transitory period of advancement in life becomes the life support, and being cut off from the “apparatus” becomes a major-major decision.

But if I had been fortunate to have made the right decision at the most opportune time, who am I to impose the same fortune on others? I am grateful for the fact that every calculated move I chose to make, no matter how brain-twisting and wrenching the long mental deliberations had been, is now reaping for me good harvests. I should be kinder.


REFLECTIONS
Genesis 33-36

Rewind:
Genesis 32:9-12 (Jacob’s prayer)
9Then Jacob prayed, “O God of my father Abraham, God of my father Isaac, O LORD, who said to me, ‘Go back to your country and your relatives, and I will make you prosper,’ 10I am unworthy of all the kindness and faithfulness you have shown your servant. I had only my staff when I crossed this Jordan, but now I have become two groups. 11Save me, I pray, from the hand of my brother Esau, for I am afraid he will come and attack me, and also the mothers with their children. 12But you have said, ‘I will surely make you prosper and will make your descendants like the sand of the sea, which cannot be counted.’”

This was Jacob’s prayer prior to his dramatic reunion with Esau, the brother he cheated 20 years earlier. It is such a sincere, no-frills prayer that states what the petitioner wants. Oh, that we could be more knowing of things to ask!!!

Forgiveness is key to peace.
Nothing more.

Then and now, the violence of rape (as in the rape of Jacob’s daughter, Dinah) affects even the sturdiest of men. Were Jacob’s sons justified in exacting revenge?

It is always nice to go back to and settle down in your roots.
(Which is what I would advice Norrie, too. There is no place better than in one where you are not considered a second-class citizen.)