Vaginal Realm

................ or so they say.

It's been 9 months since my father moved in with me. He retired from work about 8 months before that. Since then I took upon myself the responsibility of carrying the weight of being the house's mistress, in the absence of a mother and a more responsible older sibling. I would pay for house renovation expenses and cable TV, while my brother shoulders half of the telephone and electricity bills. And more often than not I do the grocery (which I'm about to do later), do the cooking, and then wash the dishes thereafter. On weeknights if I had an early night off I would press my clothes, and on weekends I would clean the house and do my laundry. All these I have to juggle with a very demanding job, quality time with my SO, dentist appointments, and weekly visits to my mom, my other brother and my dogs in the province.

This is not a rant. This is just simply a recollection of how active I am despite the feeling that I don't accomplish anything. Hah, talk about quarter life crisis.

Going home to the old house has become a regular for me even though I moved out of it about 4 years ago. I started living on my own at the age of 20 and since then have learned to take care of myself. Now I'm 24, the weight of role-reversal starts to kick in as I now take responsibility on father, and my immediately older brother takes care of mother. My parents are in their 60's but not decrepit; they're still pretty active for their age. But loneliness kills the heart like cancer, and for two people who have been together for 33 years, they need not tell their children that for an old person time is all he has, that time is all that he wants, because at this age of carbon monoxide and monosodium glutamate and bone marrow anyone can run out of time anytime.

I will not deny my father of my time. To calculate, for the first 20 years of my life he raised me, and now that he's 61 I'd be damn happy if I'd be granted an equal number of years to return the favor. In fact, I wanna do something more for him because I know that he and mother had to let go of most comforts in life to send their 4 offsprings to good schools. That the lost opportunity of leisure when you can best enjoy it is irreplaceable and sadly regrettable.

For Philippine economic standards, I'm a middle-income earner for the workforce of my age. That is assuming that at my age I only spend for myself, with some scraps saved little by little for the rainy days, or for a grand vacation in summer. But I want to earn more, so that someday...

I can take father to a trip around the world
Maybe we'll stop at England for a week or two to watch Wimbledon
And get him an autographed shirt or ball from his favorite players
Buy him the most efficient tennis racket available so he'd always play the best game
Get him a lifetime subscription of Inquirer or Newsweek so he'd never have to worry about alzheimer's
Hire a driver to let his failing knees rest when within horrible Manila traffic
And of course, pay for the best doctors to take care of his hypertension

I also want to take mother around the world
Go to a shop-til-you-drop European tour where we'll ransack the churches and the shops
Eat shortcake and drink tea al fresco while listening to the music of the European streets
Enjoy a full beauty treatment together for a whole day
If she wanted to, she can get botox or diamond peel without worrying about the bill
Build her a small house in Tagaytay beside her mother's and her sister's, where she'll pass the time tending her little garden
Buy her a reliable spacious car with a driver to boot
And of course, pay for the best doctors to take care of her hypertension

I wanted to do all these for them. Because I know this was what they wanted to do together. I love them both so dearly, and I wish someday I'd have the courage to tell them just that when they can still hear me.

Labels: random ramblings