Feline Culture

Patricia's Luke
Nenette's Niko and me (Sorry, can't copy-paste Wes's photo here, so please see the June 2005 entry of my blog.)
Niko again below in festive attire.

Everybody loves cats.

Suyin has Checkov and Isabelle. Nenette has Niko. Manoy has Figgie. Patricia has Luke.

I once had Wes.

God, how I miss my Wes. But, since I left home last July, she also left. I know that she used to leave home often but not for long. She used to come back to me after a day or two. According to Suyin, Wes did not return anymore.

How sad. I know that she must have been so lonesome and she must have left home to look for me.

Cats are like humans. They long for their love ones. Figgie cries out loud whenever Manoy leaves home for quite a time, and Figgie would know that. Cats have always a way of knowing. Wes didn't cry when I left home, but I saw how sad her eyes were. She knew, coz she stayed away from me and climbed atop the roof. That was where she was last seen.

Cats love to stay home. Wes stayed because of love and left in search for it.

I have never stopped looking for it too.

The Spirit in St. Augustine

Castillo de San Marcos

The Atlantic Ocean


Antique clothes in an antique shop

More stores and restaurants


Old house with balcony

Balconies in old abodes
Old hut turned into a coffee house
The Stogies Coffee Bar and me

There is this place called St. Augustine, just north of Florida, by the Atlantic Ocean; which transported me again into the past. My love for old places and old abodes triggered my heart again to live beyond time and space.

I dunno, but whenever I see such quaint places, my heart would seem to burst into a longing for that something and someplace where I used to live. Sometimes I want to believe that I was born in the 1500s to the 1800s and that I do not belong to this post-modern era. Is this about my spirit again in another human form, (which I once wrote in one of my blog entries)?

In St. Augustine, some old houses were restored and turned into shops and coffee bars. The first time I stepped on the first road round the bend, my heart suddenly stopped upon the sight of a shop selling antique clothes. I felt that surge of feeling when one wants to fit into a dress or an attire for just one sweet moment. The same feeling was also felt upon the sight of an old coffee house, an old balcony to watch people go by, an old table with two Baroque stools and two people face to face as seen from a window in a bar, and the narrow cobbled streets where I had this tingling effect from someone seemingly familiar and special, a touch maybe that carved a lasting memory, or maybe someone leading my way with his hand upon my waist. Feelings that seemed to open scenes that occurred sometime in the past, something I never wanted to erase from the mind.

The fort called Castillo de San Marcos struck me as something painful but which cannot be defined. Somehow, there was this deep feeling of loneliness and longing... a desire. I also felt this way when I saw the old huts of Ulm in Southern Germany in 1997.

But, that is another story.

Four Sisters

Once upon a time, there were four sisters who lived in a big house in a small town. Their parents built this big house so that everybody would have space to live and play.Their Mom was a strict schoolteacher and she taught them how to read and write, to love each other, and to learn how to appreciate the little things around them. She didn't spare the rod to discipline her girls. Their Dad was a lawyer and a defender of the poor and never got paid for his services. They had very little money so toys were not bought but created among themselves. They made paper dolls with paper dresses, gathered dried leaves and twigs to cook root crops taken from the backyard, and mounted plays and dance dramas on a makeshift stage in the rice granary under the main house. They loved to gather leaves from plants to use as paper money as payment for those stage presentations.

They grew up and went to the University of the Philippines (UP) to study. They all went through the different stages in life as students, as workers, and later as wives and mothers. All of them, in one time or another became teachers. Each carrying different principles and beliefs. Then, one by one, they flew to other countries to pursue their goals in life, and to define their own successes in their own lives. Each one having a strong mind and personality, leaving her man when needed, bringing up strong offsprings as well, leaving home for ideologies and beliefs, and trying the most difficult and untrodden roads.

On one cool new year's day, the four sisters now older, drove to a place called Gulf Breeze and there they seemed to stopped time for almost three days to tell each other's stories from faraway places. They laughed and cried, talked non-stop at the top of their voices, and discussed issues till their voices cracked and got hoarse. They watched a movie and shopped till they dropped.

Then, it was time to leave again. They embraced and parted ways. Nobody mentioned about the future and if they would ever meet again.

But, who cares? Their love for each other still remains and nothing else matters.

The GAJOs on New Year's Eve 2009

New Year's Eve was definitely for the GAJOs.

After almost 40 years, the Gajo siblings had come together at last.

One by one they came, Manoy (Wito), Manay (Nene), Ade, Nenette, and me. Each bringing along different memories of the past, each depicting a character, a life, a belief, and scars in feelings and preferences.

Manoy had this dream of having all his siblings around him. That wish came true and even for only 24 hours starting on New year's eve, we gathered around him coming from all different places, California, Canada, Florida, and the Philippines.

It was a once-in-a-lifetime experience. I saw the rare twinkle in Manoy's eyes, the all-giving and all-loving gestures as he sang along with Nenette and Ade, the fulness of his mouth as he laughed and smiled all throughout the night, and most of all, the invisible love that was there, which I felt and which we all want to feel.

HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL YOU LOVELY GAJOs!!!!

Christmas Day

Christmas day usually starts on Christmas eve.

This was my first Christmas here. We had the usual opening of presents last night with Manoy and Julie and the Tolentinos as well as Pancho's family. There was also the usual poker tourney won by Pancho this time.

On Christmas morn there were more presents especially for the kids. I was about to retire and take a much needed nap when Manoy started to play old video tapes of past Christmases in Canada. It was on December 25, 1990. I saw my siblings and Mama. My tears came quickly at the edge of my eyes. Suddenly, I missed Mama so much. A sudden surge of longing overwhelmed me when I saw that familiar pout in her lips and the usual stance of arms upon her waist, the curls of hair on her head, and the sharp flash of those intelligent eyes. When Patricia started interviewing Manay, Nenette, and Manoy,we all listened; everyone seemed to be having fun. When it was Mama's turn to talk, she pounced and hit the videocam as it was focused on her. Everybody laughed coz it was so typical of her. She had a mind of her own and won't submit to other people's whims or wishes. There was a lump in my throat. I felt so intensely sad and lonely and wished all at once to be with this woman who always felt the same care and love for me and my siblings throughout her whole life. She might be hard on herself and others but she always meant well especially toward her children forgetting her own self.

I feel bad now because I was not able to show and give her the love that could have made her happy in the last days of her life. We never had the chance. I was mostly away working in Manila when she returned to Sorsogon from the US. And when she suffered a stroke, it was too late.

Come to me Mama, let me feel you now.

Deltona

Deltona is a small city in Central Florida. I live here now with my brother and his wife Julie. We live in a little house full of sunshine with lots of flowers and citrus fruits around the premises. My room has a door leading to a garden with a statuette of two angels. I like it here becoz of the rain that showers the plants in the morning and at night. Just like Sorsogon.

Last night, my brother and I watched the launching of the rocketship Endeavor from our house's frontyard... a blast of fire that brightened up the sky like a conflagration. It took off from NASA base camp in Titusville 50 miles away with lots of people cheering and shouting as seen from TV screens. These are hard times so Americans love to see bigger happenings, to prove that they will overcome eventually. The rocketship was a symbol of hope and greatness.

This reminded me of Obama's winning the presidential election last November 4 with a million Americans cheering and crying at the Times Square in New York city just like new year's eve. At the same time, a throng of people was rallying infront of the White House crying out for the immediate oust of President Bush. Ya, that also reminded me of the 1986 people's power that ousted then Philippine president Marcos. The scenario was the same...people rushing out into the streets shouting as church bells kept ringing everywhere, people running out from their homes including me... the crowd physically carrying me off my feet onto the gates of Malacanang.

This is the United States of America, the land of the free. But how free? With the recession still deeply embedded into the economy, and into the minds of Pinoys... how far is the American dream...or will another cross burn again in the middle of the night?

Hello Florida!

Mt. Dora's version of a "tiangge"
Me at Mt. Dora's downtown


Am new here in Florida and as usual am getting the feel of this place yet.

The glens, the lakes (both natural and man-made),the old towns, the old houses, the country houses with horses, and yes... alligators!

I miss sophisticated California and its 94.7, and hello to Florida's country songs and church music. Hello to beautiful Deland and Mt. Dora (no mountains tho) but quaint towns.

I think I will love it here. I always adapt to places especially when they strike me with something new and old. Also, unlike California, rain comes to us like morning showers here. Something like Sorsogon's cool evening rains...

I also like the people in this Obama county...aggressive and conscientious... no not laid-back, but deeply political and extremely religious but ecumenical in outlook. Now, looks like am getting near the roots of the South... not really the Deep South but quite near.

94.7

Victoria Gardens at Rancho Cucamonga


Am just counting the days... two days away and I will be off to another world after my leisurely vacation down here in California.

One of the things I'd be missing is ninety-four.7... 94 what? Yes, I've been listening to this radio station for nights with my MP4 plugged to my ears and it kind of taught me the legends and trends of jazz and blues. Now, I know why Auggie got hooked to this kind of music and why the Southerners here have developed that kind of cult-following for that kind of sound. Well, just ask me who these fellas are... Louis Jordan, Chick Correa, Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Miles Davis,Bing Crosby, Ella Fitzgerald, etc. etc. and I'd be talking 'bout them non-stop. When I go deeper down South, probably to the land of the blues, hope to discover some more of that essential black sound.

Now that the days have gone deeper into Fall, the winds are chilling me to the bones. However, California is so blessed with a perennial sun that people just love to walk and bask under it. At the Victoria Gardens, people just sit around, walk or chat under the sun... as Europeans do. Now, I know why Californians are laid back, so they say.