My Blessing for a Lifetime

I got married in July 28, 2001 with my beloved Ronald. Some questioned my decision, my family included, but stubborn and firm that I am, the marriage came through. Who cares anyway? This is my life. My happiness. And who would dare judge the purity of intentions and depth of love my dearest hubby has for me? He is that one person who understands me with all my insecurities and feigned pride. A realization I had after making our life as a couple miserable because of my selfishness and insensitivity and impatience and smugness and all that blackened tinge of who I am. I almost blew that love made in Heaven to bits and bits of teardrops and pain.

There was a major episode in our love story that changed all my perspectives in life. I was impulsive. Stubborn. I was sensitive for my feelings but unfeeling of Ronald's emotions. I only listened to myself. I was proud but remained envious of what others have that I don't. Especially so when after almost a year, we were still not blessed with a child despite and in spite of all the prayers, I almost begged for a child. I was almost cursing the Lord for not granting us the child we want when there are a number of women out there aborting that little life throbbing inside their wombs. I question Him, "Why not give that baby to me?" See… I was nothing compared to who I project I am. I was no good to anyone, especially to my husband. I am a nobody, I thought. A hollow woman who loved no one but myself. My happiness was my only goal in life, if there really was. The more I shammed my happiness, the more it grew further away from me – because I was never worthy of it. I never knew how is it to fully love – funny! But I have always claimed I did know how to love. I got hurt. Was it love? Perhaps it was sheer wounded pride. A bruised ego.

All these recognition of the mistakes I have done was because of Ronald. He has showed the real me; yet remained beside me and loved me for what I am and who I am and I am not. He placed a mirror in front of me that I may see the "fork-and-tail" image of myself – not to put me down or destroy me like other people have been doing or might have done in any way as far as I can remember, but to rebuild me into a new and better person I thought I was never capable of becoming.

Then there was I… challenged by the love Ronald offered me. I am determined. I don't say I am now perfect. But I am trying. I don't say I have completely eradicated the "bad" me, but I'm struggling. I don't say our life as a couple is a bed of roses. Because roses have thorns. I am not alone though when I am hurt or when I feel down or insecured. I have now found someone who constantly inspires me to be who I really am and give meaning to my every stride.

I did not finish my Master's degree all by myself. The more that I did not win as Best Thesis alone. The idea of my title puffed in my mind somewhere because I experienced myself the interplay of those same variables and molded me to be who I am with Ronald making those facts available in my information bank. My data was completed because Ronald carefully filled in every cell in my blank table. I could have not patiently beat the deadline in those tormenting nights without him by my side, with a glass of hot milk or coffee to keep me up and the sumptuous meals he has prepared to nourish my decaying brain that every once in a while stop in momentary stupor.

I should have not pushed through with yet another Master's degree in Special Education if not for his encouragement and earned those units in Education. He was always there, giving a push. Telling me I'm good. Saying I can be the best in every endeavor I undertake. He takes good care of me and our kids the way I wished I was taken cared of by my own father.

I could have not been a proud mother of my two cute and loving little angels if it weren't for Ronald who provided the complementary gene in my own gene pool to come out with such little girls – the focus of my profoundest hormonal affection (their father included, of course).

I should have been the same bitchy me if Ronald hasn't crossed my life space. I am never the same again because of him. My life has found more meaning and reason and all the beautiful and colorful hues of amber and bright scarlet and shades of crimson and some velvety stuff this world is made of.

Complete?

I may not be… but I am almost there.

To Ronald -- my most beloved, HAPPY FATHER'S DAY!

And to all the Dad's out there -- love your wife, love your kids... after a long day's work, you'd be going nowhere but come home to them; so there's no healthier way but to paint a smile on your face and an overflowing love for your family when you make that stride in your doorstep.

First Talk: THE BIG BANG

In the NO BEGINNING -- was GOD.

God's breath hovered over a vastness of darkness, silence and peace. God's heartbeat pulsated in endless acres of emptiness -- an emptiness that was pregnant with life.

In a way that we cannot fully comprehend, that seamless space of peaceful silence was God.

And in God's breath and heartbeat -- was YOU.

In the NO BEGINNING.

Eons and eons ago -- in that time which cannot be measured, the promise of life was contracted into an infinitesimally small particle, so small that would not have seen it if you were there because in fact, it was space-less and it was time-less.

The promise of life was compressed energy, hot and dense.

As in everywhere else, God was also in that tiny particle of energy with a very special intent of love.

God was about to create the universe from within, by empowering it in a way that the universe would be able to participate with God in creating itself.

And so through immeasurable years, the energy moved on to greater and greater density transforming into a fireball.

About 14 billion years ago, at the exact, right moment, the fireball exploded mightily.

The energies flew apart, billowing out in all directions with incredible heat -- trillions of degree of heat.

The dispersal of the heat-energies created space, expanding that space more and more as the particles flashed forth further and further.

With this explosion, TIME BEGAN.

And Light came forth and shone everywhere, with no shadows, because there was nothing then.

This was the original energy of the universe.

People call it by different names: the Big Bang, the Flaring Forth, the Birth.

It was just the right moment.

Scientists say that if the explosion had taken place a fraction of a second earlier or later, the universe would never have come to be.

If the explosion had taken place a fraction of a second later, it could never have coalesced into concrete beings at a later stage; a fraction of a second earlier and it would have collapsed back on itself. It was by a slim, almost zero-margin of possibility that THE UNIVERSE CAME INTO BEING.

It was not by chance; it was divinely intended by God who was that energy within.

The mysterious "inness of God" here and in all the forms and beings that would emerge from it in the billions of years.

For a million years there was nothing but light and heat energy from the Big Bang in the vastness of space. It took all these million years for it to cool down. But the light remained in the galactic skies. Vestiges of that seemingly interminable heat energy remained for billions of years later in the form of fire.

Why did it take the universe so long to heat up and to cool down in the process of its becoming?

It was her way because it was God's way, God who was within the explosion, within the blocks of heat-energy everywhere, within the cooling down at last.

And you... you, in all this, was in the heartbeat of God.

This was the first of the four talks given to us during our Recollection -- an annual celebration of all personnel in our school -- a time to recollect the blessings and struggles in our lives; a time to recollect ourselves and our faith in God before we finally say our pledge of commitment and accept the commissioning of the Holy Spirit in our ecological thrust and educational advocacy.

It is indeed a perfect timing for us to re-learn our history, for it is only in re-discovering our forgotten origins that we become more grateful of who we are and what have we become.

It is also a perfect timing to seek God in the midst of all the environmental struggles we are going through, as people, as His co-creators -- we have in some ways followed another path -- the path of damnation, destroying the only world we could live in -- the world He has given us to take care and pro-create and co-create.

Let us not wait for our world to succumb itself to death... for when this world dies, we die with it, too.

So I invite you to journey with me in this great gift of BEING ALIVE.

Bea's Artwork

Two days after Bea's closing program, I noticed she was all bored with watching the same Barney, Blue's Clues and Dora cds.

That same day, a brother from my "Youth for Christ" days dropped by my office and was holding pamphlets on a summer enhancement program. And so the story began of sleepless nights that Ronald and I was deciding what program should Bea be in this summer.

We never agreed on something, until we decided to ask Bea herself.

Without blinking an eye, Bea said, "I want an arts class."

And so she did. Eighteen hours to complete and these are her work of art or should I say, where she spent her energy this summer aside from swimming -- the fruit of her labor and passion:

shading exercises

placing shadows

color combination

coloring with oil pastel

"Fruits" using colored pencil

"Clown Fish" using oil pastel on felt paper

"I am" using oil pastel

"My Day" using oil pastel and water color

"Just Me" using oil pastel

"Little Mermaid" using oil pastel in felt paper

"Day at the Beach" using oil pastel in felt paper

"Walrus" using oil pastel in felt paper

Bea's love for arts indeed was shown in how she has spent her summer just holding her kit. Her love for water manifested itself, too (aside from arts class, she was also enrolled in a swimming class in the morning) through her outputs. Most of her drawings are sea-based -- sea creatures, mermaid, ocean, seashore, the beach and all.

For Moms who might accidentally drop by my site, hope you'll learn from my experience, too. "Never decide for your children all the time!"

You might think you know what's best for them (like I always feel), but sometimes, it is also best for our children to grow and be the person that God planned them to be by making a little step farther and just let them be.

Bea's discovery of her talent might not have been possible if my being "MOM" got in the way.