Letters to Marge: Chapter 27 (See you in the future...)

Dearest Margaret,

It’s been a while since I’ve written anything in here. You’ve learned how to sort of “really” talk for over half a year or so now, so what I might have written here before, I have been saying to you personally.

You should know that as of now, your mother and I classify you as quite noisy, but adorably so.

So far, it has been quite a wonderful year or so since my last e-letter. Your young achievements so far include:

- Finally starting to go to school.

- Going to ballet school

- Talking in fully comprehensible sentences
- Having seen the following movies in a cinema (in no particular order): Rango, Tangled, Mars needs Moms, Kung Fu Panda, Shrek, complete with gorging on pop corn.
- You also like taking pictures

Little quirks you have developed so far include:

- Calling all forms of meat on the dining table as “Chicken”

- Learning to discriminate and prefer low-fat milk, because “mommy said…”

- Holding my head and face and turning me to the direction of whatever it is you’re talking about.

- Being an absolute camera-whore

Oh, and you have thus far been able to spell and write your name. Congratulations, baby.

But I am sad to say that this is for now my last letter to you in this series. Because instead of writing to you about things, I am currently able to say them to you face to face. A much better deal, frankly.

So while this letter seems to sound like a long-winded goodbye, it really is my “official” hello to a fully talking you (batteries not included, nor needed).

I love you.

‘catch you later.

Dad

Letters to Marge (Chapter 26): Watching you sleeping...

Dear Margaret...

I watched you sleeping... And i imagine you must be dreaming of cupcakes in the clouds, flying fish, and dogs that talk and makes jokes with you.

The yellow bricks on the road before you must be lined with little flowers that bat their eyelashes at you when you walk by. At the very least, because your own eyes are no less beautiful.

How big is the world for you to yet know, so many more colors than the forty eight crayons you doodle with, so much more music beyond the little rhymes we sing together with your mother. So much more life ahead...

Wake up tomorrow to a beautiful sun that may not last forever, but will shine for you and make blue skies and turquoise oceans that wrap the earth while you walk on it.

Do not forget to smile and look for the good in people before thinking ill of them. At least for now, while the innocence has not left you.

Walk through the day knowing that you are loved like the moon is loved by the stars that shine around her. The very stars that watch over you tonight like i do.

Love,

Dad

Letters to Marge (Chapter 25): Another Pointless Weekend 020511

Dear Marge,

So last weekend was totally unexciting and uneventful.

And i loved it.

Between a brief morning meeting for me, a morning dental appointment for your mom, Saturday found us lazing away at the house ALL DAY. And yes, i loved it.

Sunday wasn’t any better. After a restful Saturday night, we went to hear mass, then proceeded to take your grandfather out to lunch in Chinatown. This was followed by an afternoon at a mall in what used to be the Rockwell Power Plant in Makati. The mall is called (in a rather tongue-in-cheek naming) the Powerplant.

Yep, you guessed it... i loved it.

As life goes on, you may find yourself always on the run. Running after deadlines, running from people who you have deadlines for, or simply trying to get more out of each day as though it were your last. Sometimes with barely enough time to sit down for lunch.  Well, these are not necessarily bad since being wanted and sought after is a pretty neat way to live, too. But that shouldn’t be the status quo, so to speak. And to have a weekend like the one you, me and your mother just had is something special.

We ran into more than a handful of people in that small mall in a big city: we ran into a cousin and her husband, another cousin’s husband and their son, an old college friend, an Indian supplier, two old ad clients, and at least three celebrities that your mother and i know, who we’re sure don’t know us.

You had mango ice cream, your mother bought you a gray jacket at Zara that i’m sure you will not wear because it isn't pink, and i bought another Transformer toy on sale for P400 which is so hard to play with that i swear they hired the guy who designed the f*cking Rubik’s cube to do those damn robots.

And freshly roasted pork jerky.

'hear that? i loved it.

The last weekend was filled with absolutely unimportant things to do. Exactly what weekends are for, my dear. Don’t forget to have some of those from time to time. Even in the supposed prime of your life.

There was one thing important in all that: giving you more reasons to run around, laugh, and just be happy for no real reason other than being alive.

I love you.

Dad

Letters To Marge (Chapter 24): A Tale of Two Cities and a Mobile Home

This was taken on New Year's Eve
of 2011 (So that's December 31, 2010),
just to be clear.

Dearest Margaret,

You are a child of two cities, Manila and Baguio City.  Three, if you include San Diego, where we had you retrieved from a freezer tank, thawed like bacon, then shoved into your mom. But more on that some other time.

At this point, the three of us have been on the road a lot. Yup, A LOT. We drive up and down so daddy (yours truly) can keep his little ad house running in Manila, while doing his share of work for the family business in Baguio City. Lots of people i know maintain more than one business, but i’m probably the only guy i know who’s regularly involved in two companies that are literally 5 hours apart. i know what i put you and mom through. And i am both grateful and apologetic at the same time. To both you and your mom, but mostly your mom since you didn't know jack about what the heck was going on.

So your mother has two houses to take care of, one with a nice garden and lots of flowers, a big kitchen, two living rooms, and an old piano she has no idea how to play. The other house is smack in cosmopolitan Manila, a bit tiny, but is our very first home, and your mom really poured her heart into making it a nice place to live. Lucky her, huh?

So which one is home?

Well... at some point, when one is on the road so often, and one can literally choose from a whole bunch of addresses and know that one will still get his mail (is there still mail by the time you read this?), it becomes almost bothersome to have to label just one place “home.” But for me, it no longer matters where the roof i’m under is in. As long as you and your mom are with me, then i know i’m home.

In a world that gets smaller every day, we often don’t have the time to settle our asses in just one couch long enough to call it home. So always keep tabs on the people you love and love you back even more (oh my, guess who those are?), wherever there are people who love you, who will take you in and accept you for everything... yup, you guessed it... you’re home, kid.

Come home to us anytime, baby.

Love,

Dad