This is for every mother this coming Mother’s Day.

You see her leave the house not to socialize or party, or to bask under the gleam of flash bulbs and spotlights.  You see her leaving the house for a trip to the grocery store or the market, haggling the cost of a kilo of pork, or ticking away non-essentials in a grocery list.  There won’t be new shoes or high heels for her feet today: that money went for new bedsheets or a stock of soap and shampoo.  She won’t get them free, most definitely, but she would get them on the best deal.  Not on the Groupon clone that she could spend hours on if she knew how, but the hours she spends in the store.  She basks under the gleam of her children’s smile.

Her look?  Nothing too fancy, nothing too stylish.  Her wardrobe is sparse, Spartan, utilitarian; the nicest clothes reserved for the wedding of her eldest, the graduation of her youngest.  Nothing too fancy either: probably the inexpensive ones from the department store or the rummage sale.  No thousand-peso jeans, no dress worth tens of thousands of pesos.  No splurges in the wardrobe, or the makeup department.  You never saw her put really expensive makeup on her face; she won’t have much use for that when she’s off to buy foundation for the eldest, or lipstick for the youngest.  Nothing too fancy, nothing too stylish.

Her most beautiful feature?  Her hands, most definitely.  The callouses, the rough palms, the very hands that do laundry, cleaning, cooking, and all sorts of things that come with motherhood.  The hands that feed children, discipline them, and teach them the right way that there is to life.  The same hands that wiped tears from eyes that see failing marks on class cards.  The same hands that comforted the shoulders of the weary, the tired, and even the brokenhearted.  Her hands are beauty, for in many ways, those hands have created life.

This is for every mother who wouldn’t have expensive make-up kits or thousand-peso dresses for Mother’s Day.  This is for every mother who saves for the daily grocery list, and not for the world’s most popular gadget.

This is for every mother whose comfort is sleep, perhaps even when awakened by the sounds of crying infants or the screams of pain for 20, or perhaps even 30 years.

This is for every mother who gave up on the caprices of the lives of ladies and took on motherhood, all out of the joy of comes with keeping life alive and well.

This is for every mother whose passion is in motherhood: that there is peace in the chaos of raising boys to be men, and girls to be women.

This is for every mother whose sanity is in family; where we men would often grow weak in the knees with just one diaper change to our credit, they do so and so many other things without fail.  And they do so out of love.

This is for every mother this coming Mother’s Day.  We, your sons, may find it so hard to say this just once, even on days dedicated to you, but we love you.

When we write, we are called to something higher than making opinions or insights; we are asked to be chroniclers of history.  Whether we’re journalists, bloggers, PR practicioners, advertisers, or just people with a pen in hand, we add to the tome of history whenever we write.  We are outlived by the text; in a way, words possess a certain power far stronger than the body that commits them into relative permanence.

A few days ago, the Filipino blogging community lost a blogger.  The media lost a journalist, the industry lost a PR practicioner.  The Gagelonia family lost a father, a brother, a husband.  A few days ago, I lost a friend in Fernando “Ding” Gagelonia.

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My grandmother always enjoyed oranges.  Her room smelled like orange peelings, the segments of dried-out fruit littered the wide plastic table that was her nightstand.  As long as her arthritic hands were willing to, she always peeled her oranges herself.  She dug her aged thumbnail into the center of the fruit as she peeled off the skin.  The tangy, tart fruit brought a quiet smile to her face.  It was as if the fruits were a calming presence in her life.

Well into her seventies, Lola was still very strong and able.  She was 73 when I was born, and her quaint figure was instrumental in raising me.  When my parents worked, she assumed a lot of roles: she cooked our food, she cleaned up after us, and kept us clean and healthy.  Well into high school she made sure we hit the books, steered us far and away from trouble, and into her eighties, even tucked me in from the top bunk that is my bed.  Carefully, at that: the two blankets and the comforter had to be perfectly aligned before she trudged out of the room, and into hers.

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When I was young, I knew everything.

When I was young, I argued with theories.  I thought that my intelligence was the weight of the argument.  There was the compulsion to drop name after name, theoretical concept after theoretical concept.  I argued with the contempt and impunity that can only come from someone not old enough to be proven wrong.  I was on a mission to prove to the world that I am right, and everything in it is wrong, stupid, and idiotic.  Big words, too; words that, from the perspective of a youthful version of me, can summarize – and solve – the problems of the national Gessellschaft.

Then I grew old enough to take up a job.  After three or so years of writing copy and etching a name for myself in the glass walls of multinationals and transnationals – from newspapers to BPO to advertising – I realized that I only “knew everything” when I was young.  In the brave new world, beyond the shelter of the Geisteswissenschaften and the arguments of privilege that came with a chair in the classroom and a book from the library, there are some things I realized.

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A size-36 waistline and a beer belly should be enough reason for anyone – yes, including myself – to take up a sport.

Fritz and Eloisa suggested wall-climbing, which me and my girlfriend Jam were more than eager to take.  She’s much more fit than I am (if you take up vice, you’re anything but “physically fit” no matter how many exercises you take up), and she took up climbing lessons before, so I was pretty much the group’s beginner.  With a pair of uncomfortable climbing shoes, I was all set.

“We really don’t have any need for wall-climbing in modern society,” I told Jam.

“Just think of it as a way for you to lose weight,” Jam replied.

There began my journey into physical fitness… or at least, the wall that stood between me and the rest of the afternoon.

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Choose life.  Choose sports.  Choose a reasonable distance.  Choose a comfortable pair of running shoes.  Choose a singlet, cap, running shorts loose enough to wick away moisture but tight enough to keep you from chafing.  Choose a number.  Choose the dramatic angle by which you cross the finish line.  Choose amber-colored sunglasses to keep the sun from fucking up your vision.  Choose brand placement and advertising on every miserable line of the race course.  Choose marathons, sprints, jogging, off-road trails.  Choose sport pedometers.  Choose Velcro arm-straps for your iPod.  Choose running.  Choose life.

Why would I want to do a thing like that?

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I took a walk along the seawall by the Mall of Asia, and looked far out into the water.  Despite the rank smell of trash and seawater, the bay looked serene.  The big mall and all its cheery Christmas lights cast reflections on the water; much as I hate malls and open bodies of water, the sight was quite… well, cute.

It was quite weird to be walking there on your own, when every couple was on a date, and every family was out strolling.  Kids were launching these glowstick-propellers, and caught them as they slowly descended into the ground.  Couples were cozy together on the park benches, and perhaps the other side of the mall was filled with hurried and harried parents buying groceries for noche buena. I was alone.

Go figure, this has always been the case for me for the most part.

I took a puff of my cigarette and looked out into the throng of people strolling, walking, seated, whatever they were doing.  A small concert was just around the corner.

Then, a short rainshower.  No one ran to the mall.  No one took cover.  Everyone just enjoyed the night.  The children still launched the glowsticks, the couples were still on the bench, the people were still walking along the park.

Here’s to Christmas, I whispered, and walked back to the mall to the tune of piped-in Christmas carols.  I guess that I found out what Christmas really means.