We are survivors

My good friend and mahjong mate, Pipang Quema de los Reyes, recently marked a birthday. She turned 97.

The next day, over the telephone, I told my classmate from grade school Elong Sison (she’s also in her 90s) about this fact and she exclaimed, “Why, Nena, we are all survivors!”

“I agree,” I replied. “We survived the dangers of World War II, the hardships of the Japanese Occupation, the bombings of the Liberation.”

She interrupted me: “Excuse me, for me, it was not the Liberation of Manila but the destruction of Intramuros. How about the martial law years and the anxious days of Edsa?”

We stopped, allowing nostalgia to overcome us. “How about rising above our losses?” she continued. “Parents, husbands, children, siblings, friends.”

“And various surgeries and ailments,” I added.

“Also, Nena, don’t forget, we’ve lived under 14 presidents,” she said, and started ticking them off. “Quezon, Laurel, Osmeña, Roxas, Quirino, Magsaysay, Garcia, Macapagal, Marcos, Cory, FVR, Erap, GMA, P-Noy…” her voice trailed off.

I concluded: “Hopefully, God willing, we may vote for another president come May next year.”

“That’s right,” she said. “We have lived through them all. God has been good to us. I repeat, we are survivors.”

That last sentence rang a bell in my memory and I looked for a clipping from the LA Times sent to me some time back by a friend in the United States. Here it is:

* * *

WE ARE SURVIVORS!

Consider the changes we have witnessed.

We were born before television, before penicillin, before polio shots, frozen foods, Xerox, plastic, contact lenses, Frisbees and the pill. We were before radar, credit cards, split atoms, laser beams and ball-point pens. Before pantyhose, dishwashers, clothes dryers, electric blankets, air conditioners … and before man walked on the moon.

We got married first and lived together … how quaint can you be? In our time, closets were for clothes, not for “coming out of.” Bunnies were small rabbits and rabbits were not Volkswagens. Designer Jeans were scheming girls named Jean, and having a meaningful relationship meant getting along with our cousins.

We thought fast food was what you ate during Lent and Outer Space was the back of the Riviera Theater. We were before house husbands, gay rights, computer dating, dual careers and commuter marriages. We were before day-care centers, group therapy and nursing homes. We never heard of FM radio, tape decks, electric typewriters, artificial hearts, word processors, yogurt and guys wearing earrings. For us, time-sharing meant togetherness… not computers or condominiums. A chip meant a piece of wood, hardware meant hardware and software wasn’t even a word.

In our day, GRASS was mowed, COKE was a cold drink and POT was something you cooked in. ROCK MUSIC was a grandma’s lullaby and AIDS were helpers in the Principal’s office. We were certainly not before the differences between the sexes were discovered but we were surely before the sex change. We made do with what we had. And we were the last generation that was so dumb as to think you needed a husband to have a baby.

No wonder we are so confused and there is such a generation gap today.

But WE SURVIVED!!! What better reason to celebrate?

* * *

I totally agree that we have every reason to celebrate. I’m of the opinion that as our time becomes more and more precious because it becomes more and more scarce, our lives must be lived somehow with a “spirit of celebration.”

My senior-citizen friends and I always celebrate our birthdays. We know that these years are bonus years and therefore recognize they are gifts from the Almighty to be celebrated with thanksgiving and joy.

So much for a spirit of celebration with others. How about with one’s self? The American poet Walt Whitman wrote in “Leaves of Grass”: “I celebrate myself.” Without falling into ego-tripping, I believe it’s healthy to value ourselves—our dignity, our personhood—and accept the fact that really, one is getting older, and not to avoid or evade the issue, much less dismiss it altogether. Or worse, start feeling that one is getting to be useless and no longer needed.

In fact, “think positive” has to be our motto. In addition, the best thing we can do at this time of our life is to serve as good role models to the youth. Young people nowadays are looking for credible examples of fidelity and steadfast love in marriage, which can be provided by us who have already celebrated our silver, coral or

golden wedding anniversaries; of honesty, loyalty and devotion to duty from those who have retired after 30 or 40 years of creditable service in government or corporations or NGOs; of strong, enduring responsible relationships that span time and space from us who have kept friendships that go back to childhood, high school and college; of the spirit of sacrifice and love of country from those of us who witnessed the Pacific War of World War II, etc.

You get what I’m driving at, right? We,  lolos  and  lolas, are now in a position where we can pass on our much-cherished Filipino traditions and values, as well as Christian virtues, to the young people whose parents oftentimes are too busy with material concerns or may not even be there for them.

Also, by doing this, being worthy role models, we will be helping to bring about what, in his  Evangelium  Vitae, Saint Pope John Paul II called “a culture of life” as against “a culture of death.”

Lourdes Syquia Bautista, 91, is a retired professor of the University of Santo Tomas,  widow, mother of 12, grandmother of 27, and great grandmother of 14.