"How high will the sycamore grow?" - colors of the wind

Questions:

How are we raising our sons?  How are we raising our grandsons?  How are we raising our schoolboys?

Answers:

There is no guaranteed formula.  It depends on what you want to pass on to your son or grandson. It depends on the parent's emotional maturity and readiness.  It has to do with one's own cultural preference/s, socio-economic status, psychological stability and maybe even to some extent- reflective ability.

Q:  Why do we even have to think about it?
A:  Because we are raising future parents and leaders.
Q:  Why do we even have to think about it?
A:  Because what we do today as parents will impact in twenty five years.

Q:  Should we even care?
A:  Die if you don't.
      If you don't care about how you are raising your sons, then why care about the trees, climate change, employment, education, health, etc, etc,?

Parent:  I only care about what he needs now.
Conscience:  Then you are on the right track.  What does he need now?

P:  He needs me.  He needs things.  He needs food.  He needs shelter.  He needs recreation, education so he gets a job- a high paying one in the dessert, in the icebergs... wherever he can make money.
C:  The first things are not bad but money at all cost?  You forgot to say "fame".
P:  I want him to be happy.
C:  We all want to be happy!  God wants us to be happy and to have a purpose.  (cliche?)

P:  Today, my 6 year old son fell from the stairs...
C:  I'm sorry.  From top to bottom of the stairs?  Is he hurt?
P:  He fell from the last 4 steps, approximately one and a half feet.  I know you would ask this- no one pushed him, he fell when he saw me.  There should be someone to hold their hands when they go down the steps. 
C:  Does he know how to hold the bannister?
P:  He should be brought down the stairs by an adult.
C:  Teach him safety.  He is 6 and should find doing things by himself safely a source of confidence and accomplishment.  Accidents happen. Tell him not to run and to walk down the steps carefully and mindfully.

Q:  Why do our sons "weaken" when they see their parents?

P:  I want to be assured that this does not happen to him again.  
C:  There is no such thing!  Sorry Mommy.  


Next:  I don't want my son to get wet in the rain


 

Growing old in Frogglerocks

Never too late to start a hobby or a quest.  In a big sense, whether 16 or 60, our interest started somewhere in childhood.  It is always something that we have begun unknowingly or knowingly in our subconscious or consciousness.

The pursuit may come later but it does come if we listen to our heart's desires or longing.  I was raised in a garden and everything that fleeted or crawled or swooped was part of my growth and part of many daydreams and nightmares.

I bought with my retirement money a digiscope to watch the birds and butterflies and most things my poor eyesight does not allow me.  I take pictures of leaves and tendrils from trees with bees and even webs from atop trees.  I catch memories of creatures in flight or rest and sometimes at play or  work.  I am stacking pictures and images that I would want to paint in watercolor and so that when I lose my wits someday, my grandchildren will see something that was sane, before I talk nonsense in my hallucinations.

Watching birds is a pursuit I am embarking on now.  I know... too many things I want to do including a hundred watercolor paintings before my next birthday.  Not too good in this department but the inspiration I see everyday could snowball a hundred paintings!

I am proud that I did not buy a new car. My humble sum would only have allowed for a measly downpayment anyway.  I am glad that I allowed kindred friends or "teachers" to show me the wonderful moments of staying frozen in one's stance to enter the space of quiet flapping of wings and melodious perch on the magical boughs laden with fruits.

Surely, this requires time, time I may not always have.  But isn't deprivation the greatest source of creativity and resourcefulness?  I will find time.  

For now, this is my great source of joy and good health...

white-collared kingfisher on a rusty fence

indigo-banded kingfisher

a watercolor study

macopas for birds and humans

frogmouth

white-bellied munia at rest after a frenzy building its nest

tattered web

a dragonfly after a rain

Waiting for Lucy

These last few weeks of pregnancy are so murderously torturous.  Not mine but the ladies-in-waiting.  Ana would be as pregnant as a polywog but walked everyday meeting her quota of 6 hours every God-made day.  That was some determination pumped up by hormones that is otherwise not there when she is not heavy with a child.   And each time, each baby came out, it was all worth it.

I have mastered the art of waiting.  Waiting for each baby to come out.  From Ana to Marie and just two weeks ago, from Anne.

Waiting for Lucy was very zen.  Anne took her steps in the most pregnant way as her date was nearing.  She wobbled from leg to leg. I would watch her and shook my head.  I told myself: "That won't do!"  So I would shout from the bridge and call out to my son Juaqui urging him to bring Anne out of the house and go window-shopping where walking would be more entertaining.

Yet Anne was as zen as the pechays growing in my garden- slowly and quietly.  I managed to trick her to walk with me one day and brought her uphill and down, around the streets of Beverly and back.  Thank God I did not kill her!  I was worried after for she is not a spartan like Ana or the swimmer like Marie.  She is a doctor and she knew what she was doing.  Yet, there I was, the snooping and meddling MIL.

My son just shook his head when he found out that his wife walked with me.  I may be 60 but that is just a number.  I can pound the streets of the subdivision with steps that meant war and victory!

Walking with the MIL did not move the baby out of her mother's womb.  So I just waited patiently.  In fact, so as to keep my mind away from the birth, when, and how, I left for a few days and celebrated my friend Therese's birthday in Cagayan de Oro.

I painted while I thought of the baby and wondered... when do I see her? What do we call her?

I came home and went to the afternoon's graduation of The Little Farm House, where my eldest grandson, Jacob was graduating from preschool.  Jose and Sophia were going to perform a dance and so I prayed and willed for the rains in Landingan airport to stop.  In the afternoon, I was welcoming and speaking before parents and friends.  My phone rang in the middle of my speech.  That was my 6th granddaughter's birth unto this world.

Evanna Lucille was born on March 22, 2014.  The parents of my grandchildren knew what they want to call their children.  I supplied names everytime but none was considered.  I am very happy though with all their names!

So Lucy was born on March 22, 2014.  Oh the blessings of a newborn! She is pink with bright almond eyes.  She is my third granddaughter and the other 3 are boys.  I have no idea what the 7th will be but Lucy is firmly and undeniably beautiful just like all these gnomes growing in Frogglerocks.

She is a good reason to go up and down the stairs and to take a bath for.  Yes, Justo demands to be given a bath before a Lucy visit. And the dirty two other boys would whisper and hum a lullabye.  The 2 girls would come in their floral summer hats and would sit gently beside her.  Ziva did manage to pinch Lucy's toe a little bit.

Frogglerocks is happy for the wait!  Even the kingfishers are chatting joyfully by the river.

And oh, the arugulas are boastful in the garden, outside where Lucy lives.

Evanna Lucille

Lucy and me

Jose, Lucy and Jacob

Sophia, Ziva and Justo

cuddle time

I am starting to figure out how... after 60 years of groping in the dark and getting up many times from unsure footing!

My treasure map is brittle and torn around the edges.  I lost my way following it many times but somehow led me back to the spot.

Maybe I thought I wanted to be somewhere else but this thing about growing older is making me see more!  Ironic but the eyes are not even seeing well around this time of the season but I am seeing more.

I am seeing more potential.  HEDCen will bloom some more and fruit a lot lot more!
More flowers, more birds in my garden.
More adventures to fill my spirit.
More grandchildren.
More laughter and less guilt.

60 is no joke but yes, it's got perks!!  Very, very nice perks!

I thought

the babies will now be Ate and Kuya

It has been years it seems.
Now that I visit, it feels like I am a stranger discovering things on pages that I wrote.

So many things have happened.
I thought they were the same story repeatedly happening to me.

There were no words for a long time.
I thought I was a wretch and my days were extraordinarily ordinary.

What was I up to?
I thought I was not doing anything because I was working.
Picking my nose and the pieces of my life peppered with many beginnings.

I thought I did not know how to write all these
because there was nothing to write.
but as I tried to grasp in words the moments that fleeted by

I thought that I have to write again.

To write about my abundant blessings is making me fizzy inside.
Here's why.

the babies are growing.  they are incessantly talking and learning.
the toddlers are tall and fat and they are very funny and very sensitive.
there are new additions to the brood.  a baby girl waiting to be born anytime.
and another on the way in October!

So much to write about I realize now, while Kiera is teaching Golda how to keep vigil at night.

relief is a simple joy

It is always good to remember that we are largely the person responsible for our fate.  We can choose to put our lives on public display like the modern television reality shows.  I think that there is an exhibitionist in all of us.  I believe that we all want to matter or there is simply a desire to say something.  But I also believe that retiring from public display will come unexpectedly when you just simply decided that it is enough. 

Monsters and Gremlins

I have monsters or gremlins sleeping over in my room almost every night.  The monsters generally live in when they sleep over.  They scatter things, pull out books from the basket and leave them everywhere.  They leave their sneeze sprinkles on the pillows.  Sometimes, they take off wearing our shirts.

The gremlins are sweet-looking little things but they have the most deadly farts!  They are like snakes slithering and crossing over each other until they are one big knot in the middle of the night.  One sits up in the dark (the genuine gremlin) and sees her grandfather sleeping with gloves.  She pulls one finger at a time while chanting "funny, hands", wears the gloves while saying the same two words as she fades in the dark again.

As we all know, monsters and gremlin are sweet while asleep.