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Contents: (click at blue dot to read chosen section)
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Chapter One: Loving Her Family and Friends CITA'S LIFE was fully lived, because it was lived in love. Her parents raised her well, and those nuns at St. Paul did a good job of evoking in her that unlimited energy called love – for family and friends, for the least of her brethren, all the way until that love extended to helping those brethren empower themselves enough so they could freely “fish” on their own.. That meant serving the people the best way she knew how, and this commitment brought her to perilous fields, causing untold sacrifices to bear on herself and her loved ones. It was all a clear statement of what she really lived to be – an ever-loving daughter of our divine Source. Daughter and Sister Cita Soriente-Reyes was born August 10, 1955 in Meycauayan, Bulacan, as the third child and first daughter of Dominador P. Soriente of Moncada, Tarlac, and Fresca Santos-Soriente of Meycauayan. Her younger sister Myrna Soriente-Estrada is now a medical doctor married to another doctor (Ruperto Estrada). Her elder brothers had both passed away at infancy. She was given the name Carmencita, carried the name “Carmen” in her school days, and was called “Menchit” at home. School to her was mostly St. Paul College of Manila (SPCM) High School, but she also attended college classes at the University of Sto. Tomas and the Far Eastern University, and took correspondence courses with CAP College. A year before her homecoming to the Source, she got herself enrolled at the UP College in Manila. Her love for her family shone in a “just for contingency” letter she dictated to me on the eve of her October 1993 operation:
“Dear Papa and Mama, Marami pong salamat sa buhay na ipinagkaloob n’yo sa akin, na patuloy ninyong binubuhay magpahanggang ngayon. (Thank you very much for the life that you have given me and continue to nurture up to now.) I’m very proud of both of you. “Ian and Nonong, I shall always be with you wherever I am. “Myrna, I may have only one kapatid (sibling) but you are so much more than one.” That last line brought back to life Cita’s poem written for Myrna, the only sibling she grew up with, on the latter’s birthday on August 12, 1990: Kaputol… ng buhay na handog ng ama, Katulad… sa hubog ng nilakhang turo ng ina. Kalaro at kasangga sa laging umaaway, Kasalong lagi sa laruan o tsokolateng nakalalaway.
Kasamang nakikilig sa mga gwapong artista, gayundin sa larong Chess o Monopoly, o tugtog, ikaw ng bandurya, at ako ng gitara.
Kapatid… masarap kasama, kailanma’y nakaukit sa maliligayang alaala ng mga araw na musmos pa. Kapatid… ipagpasensya sana, ang mga panahong napikon at nawalan ng gana; ng kapusukan at kamurahan ng isip lamang, ito ay dala. Kapatid… lubos na ikinagagalak, ipinagpapasalamat na kahit iisa, katumbas ay lima. Fellow-cutting from the life given by father, Molded in the same nurturing teachings of mother. Playmate and sparring partner in many a quarrel, After which we always share a toy or yummy chocolate.
Thrillmate over handsome actors, or over Chess or Monopoly Or in enjoying music played by you with a bandurya and by me with a guitar. Sister, a pleasant companion, always marked in happy memories of our shared childhood Sister, please forgive the times when I fell into a bad mood or exuberance due to immaturity. Sister... I’m so glad and grateful that even if you are only one, your equivalent is five.
Wife and Mother On top of all her work in serving the people, she never missed opportunities to be with me, her husband, a fellow communicator and fellow traveler in serving the people, and our two fast-growing boys, Plebeian (Ian) and Pilipino Amado (Nonong), making and maximizing quality time to be with us in the routines of family life and occasional opportunities for movies and even outings. On her own birthday, August 10, 1990, she wrote a poem in Tagalog, dedicated to me:
Kabiyak Katuwang, kabiyak ng tahanang galak, Di lamang “katalik,” kaibigan pang matalik. O karamay sa daigdig kong makulay, Salamat! O pampaligaya ng aking buhay! Partner, halfmate in a happy home, Not only a love-partner, but a very close friend, A fellow-traveler in my colorful world, Thanks! O bringer of happiness in my life!
This was to be followed two years later by two pained poems which I discovered by accident a year after she had died. In the first one, written on Valentine’s Day of 1992, her use of the word “halved” hinted about a big problem we had, my heart having strayed to also love deeply a special friend aside from her.
This poem was very reassuring. It might have been an earnest but very difficult effort to give assurance. your love full or halved i gladly receive whatever you can give, as long as it’s genuine and sincere. let not the old ways return, let’s kiss and make up and go on in the next chapter of our joint lives.
in the prime of your youth i loved the man in you; in the ripeness of our age i shall love the boy in you. In the second poem, pain is in almost every line. So is love. A fierce battle rages within her heart. Both the magnitude of her love and that of her pain are gigantic titans fighting it out. Without any side clearly winning, that struggle freezes at the end of the poem, which ends in confusion. unconditional love, what is it? i thought i loved you. no ifs and buts i did love you unreservedly with complete surrender. but when you hurt me, when i knew you have loved somebody else too and kept it from me for as long as you could, i found out i don’t love you that unconditionally. they say true love is giving and asking nothing in return. i guess i can’t keep that kind of love when i’m deceived. you’ve been truly sorry. you’d do everything to bring back yesterday. and you’ve done all you could yet, i won’t be appeased. you are truly sorry. why can’t i forgive you if i love you truly? maybe, not enough. i have never been so confused in my life. i have never been so unsure in my life. About a week or so before she passed away, she called me to listen closely to what she was to say. And she whispered the words that would now complete her embrace, words that ring much more sharply in my heart now that I have read these poems which she never showed me. She told me with a sweet smile: “I understand now. I believe you never loved me any less when you also felt very deep love for (our friend). I know now that you really are, indeed, overflowing with love.” We were both in tears. She was in much physical pain, but her eyes shone with inner peace. And with love – deep love that I cannot expect, much less demand, to receive and enjoy ever again. The song I composed for her first death anniversary nine years ago expresses this. If translated into English, that song would run this way: Would there be someone who’d arrive in my life? Would there be one who’d love me very much? Would there be one who’d welcome me always With loving joy, and an embrace that’s just for me? I could fall in love again, why not? Meet one or another, whom I’d enthrone in my heart, But there might not be anyone who’d even come close To giving me love as intense as that of my first queen! My heart, now in pain, tends to retreat to timidity, Afraid to fall in love again and fail, be frustrated. So I turn to seeking more and more friends Who’d help me lighten somehow my loneliness. Add to this the opposite fear that I might hurt somebody’s heart again, the way I had hurt the ever-loving and readily-forgiving heart of Cita. To this day I treasure these words she addressed to me in a love letter on our 14th wedding anniversary: “This heart, which is yours as well, loves you so strongly, so dearly, more than I can ever express in words. It is filled with wonder, fascination, admiration and gratitude for the beauty of your person, o Noble One. If you were a king, you would be one of the wisest. If you were a president, you would be one of the best. If you will become a hero, you will surely be revered. One, if not a few, of your writings will be a classic. A monument of you now stands in my heart. “So sincere and loving, so single-hearted and devoted are you, Great Soul. You were never a domineering, demanding husband and rarely asked anything from me. You deserve nothing less than devoted, unselfish love and loyalty. And my soul cries out in me to see the beauty of our love which stood the test of time when it was not possible for us to live one life, to share our lives together, because they were not ours.”
I felt all these words repeated when she wrote for me in her notebook a year and a half later (Oct. 7): “Thank you for 16 loving years.” Her relationship with our two boys was very special. (It’s a pity that our eldest son, Pilo, died of sickness at age 1, and did not grow up to feel her motherly love for long.) On April 5, 1994, two months before she passed away, Cita wrote in her diary about the difficult dialogues she had with our two sons: “I called my eldest son, Ian, and started the most difficult conversation I ever had with him. “I began with… ‘Son, remember the time I told you to pray hard for me because I was very sick?’ My son nodded, slightly puzzled. “I continued, ‘Son, I’m not getting well. This may mean that Jesus may take me soon.’ Then tears flowed from my eyes. “Ian was silent, as if he did not grasp what I had just said. “Then I asked, ‘What are you thinking, my son? What are you feeling?’ He sobbed. I embraced my son. For some moments we were both silent. “I told him not to suppress himself, to let it out. When he calmed down, I continued… “I explained that it wasn’t sure yet that I would go. For all we knew, I might still get well and we might just laugh at ourselves some years ahead, that once upon a time, we had this drama. “I think that relaxed him. Then, I went on to asking him to be brave and to be always there for his father, ready to help him. “And for the first time in my life, I gave a promise to my son that I wasn’t sure I could fulfill. “Throughout our relationship, they grew up knowing their parents fulfilled their promises to them. My sons knew at a very tender age the meaning of palabra de honor. “Because we valued our word to them, they learned to believe in us and trust our word, and to us they felt compelled to tell the truth. “But now, I could not resist breaking that rule Ding and I had set. “I told my son, ‘Ian, just remember this: wherever I am, I will always be there for you. Anytime, anywhere you need me, I will be there to help you.’ “In my mind, I told God, ‘Lord, you have to help me on this. You just have to, for taking me so early in my sons’ lives. You’ve just got to cooperate.’ Then, I realized I was making a demand on the Lord. I prayed, ‘Just this one, I ask of you so desperately.’ “And Ian seemed assured by that promise. He smiled and became happy. “Then we talked about high school and how it would help him decide what he wants to be when he grows up. “I told him that high school is a wonderful time in a person’s life. It was one of my best and happiest years. I told him to bask in the whole breadth of knowledge that would shine on him, to learn as many skills and sports as he can. That way he’d also learn and discover many, many things about himself. “I said that college is not the time to decide what course he will take but the time to specialize on what he has decided to be or on the profession he has chosen. “I recalled for him who he was as a little boy. He was very active and curious. But because he had no constant mother/love figure, he learned not to trust, he did not know how to listen and to care and give back attention or affection. He had tantrums as if he were a spoiled brat. “But he had a sharp mind – a very good memory and a keen interest in the logic of things, the logic of explanations. “Ian has grown into an independent and responsible 6th grader. He graduated with three medals – honorable mention, best in science, and leadership in Boy Scouts. “He has shown strong discipline in his studies and is very orderly and neat with his things and himself. He is very systematic with his time. “He still needs to be respectful and appreciative of his brother. “He is very concerned with fairness, many times to a fault, as he still needs to dissociate fairness from absolute equality with his brother. “He easily gets upset with difficulties which he perceives as out of his control. He makes impulsive or irrational decisions when he’s upset, which he later regrets,. “Most of these I didn’t tell my son. I told him that ever since his brother and he came to the world, Ding and I had been really happy. That they were the product of their parents’ deep love for each other, and that we were very very proud of the two of them. “My son seemed assured. We held each other’s hands for a while longer. After some moments, I told Ian to go and play with his brother. With some hesitation, he left my side. But the whole night that night, he would lie by my side from time to time. Before he went to bed, he gave me a tight hug and a sweet smile. “I was glad I took the risk of telling him. I realize I have so many things to tell him that can’t all be told in one sitting. But it paves the way for our relating to each other in the context of my state, without denying any feelings about it. “A day later, I told my second son, Nonong, I could not read his feelings very well. It was as if he was paralyzed by shock or he could not comprehend what I was talking about. He turned very, very serious. Maybe the impact on him was less than on Ian because death might still be an abstract concept to him. “I also promised that I would always help him wherever I am. I made him promise to be brave and help his father and brother. To all these, very seriously and obediently, he said ‘yes.’ ”
Daughterly, Sisterly Friend On June 12, 1994, .something extraordinary happened at the Loyola Memorial Chapels in Guadalupe, Makati City. The first ones to ask puzzled questions about it were the guards at Loyola– “Who had died? Was she a rich matron? A government official?” they asked among themselves. They couldn’t understand why so many visitors were packing a certain funeral chapel, spilling to the corridors leading to it, and crowding even the passageways that led to other chapels. Up to now I cannot fully explain how that happened. I can’t remember having an exact figure, but I do recall having had a hard time wading through the crowd that had come to Cita’s wake, when I arrived there after taking care of some chores at home, a short jeep ride away. There were rich people although they were vastly outnumbered by the not-so-rich and the downright poor. There were government officials, but they were also greatly outnumbered by leaders and members of non-government organizations and people’s organizations. And she was neither rich in material wealth nor occupying a government slot on the taxpayers' payroll. But Cita had a lot of friends. She had touched a lot of personal lives by being a team-playing colleague to them and, more importantly, she was a daughterly/sisterly friend to them. They came, and brought along friends who had learned of the effect she had had on them. Maybe some were there to see for themselves if this cancer patient who had had melanoma for 15 years but had stubbornly remained an active workaholic, had really embarked on her final rest. Who knows? All I remember now is that the impromptu memorial tribute for her had so many speakers that it stretched on and on (the tape of this has been misplaced; I am still looking for it). Actually, there would have been more people crowding her chapel at Loyola if her countless friends among farming families and former base workers in Central Luzon had found out about her passing and could actually come. Surely, Cita “must have done something good,” and not just good but really great, for such a large number of people to turn up at her wake a decade ago. And people who have had a close association with her know what this “greatness” was. She was always so natural, so spontaneous, so sincere in her interactions with anyone and everyone. For example, Nilda, the owner of the carinderia near our place, had a few chats with Cita and that was enough for her to consider my wife as her “own sister.” At a mass a few months before her passing, Nilda extemporaneously wrote a poem on a card in large pentel-pen letters, and tearfully gave it to her. Cita treasured this poem to the end:
Salamat,Cita, Marami kang naituro sa akin. Mahina ako, Ipinakita mo ang iyong lakas. Mabuway ako, Ipinadama mo sa akin ang iyong tatag. Duwag ako Namalas ko ang iyong katapangan. Marupok ako, Dama ko ang iyong katatagan. Kabuuan ka ng isang tunay na kaibigan! Napakaikli para sa akin ang panahon upang ipadama sa iyo Na nakaukit ka dito sa puso ko – kasama ng mga Mahal ko sa buhay. Isang gabi, nagising akong umiiyak. Bakit ikaw pa? Bakit, Cita? Ah! Kung ikaw hindi nagtatanong Ako pa? Ah! Sabi ko, malakas, matatag, matapang ka. Dapat ako rin… Thank you,Cita, You have taught me a lot. I am weak, You have shown me your strength. I have been wavering, You have made me feel your firmness. I’ve been a coward, I’ve seen your courage. Marupok ako, I feel your firmness You are the epitome of a real friend! Time is too short for me to make you feel That you have been etched deep in my heart along with the people I love. One night, I woke up weeping. Why does it have to be you? Why, Cita? Ah! If you are not asking Why should I? Ah! As I said, you are strong, firm, and brave. I should also be, like you… Cita would always relate person-to-person. And whatever political or advocacy agenda she had in relating with people was well within a sincere desire and sense of fulfillment to relate as a sisterly or daughterly friend. Whenever she said or wrote the slogan, “Serve the People!”, she would always remember a veritable multitude of very familiar flesh and blood faces within the vast coverage of the political term “people,” which to many would only be a faceless crowd. Not to Cita, who served the people because she actually loved many persons among them. And, as we see in the next chapter, loving and serving the people was her life! (Something not really very ordinary happened after the printing of the few copies of the Pilot Edition of this book. Cita was even making new friends from “where” she has been in the Afterlife! (Ms. Joydee Robledo had encouraged me with a short-text message on the eve of my marathon-writing of this book, after having put it off for a decade, saying: “she understands you now more than ever. I hope you do the same.” (Later, leafing through a copy of the pilot edition her encouragement had made possible to be produced in time for Cita’s 10th anniversary, Joydee read on the very first page she had opened to read: “[Cita] told me with a sweet smile: ‘I understand now.’ “ This jolted Joydee and made her smile a nervous smile. “Grabe! This is almost exactly the same line in the message I texted to you! Cita herself must have whispered it to me that night!” (This lady writer and project manager has since considered Cita to be her own friend, even appreciating what she felt was Cita’s presence in her room in the office one evening when she was working there alone. “I think I even heard her say ‘Psst!’ to me but I never felt afraid.” (After reading the book, she remarked: “What a strong character!” (Cita is still making new friends and touching lives-- actually, it’s not at all surprising for people who know her!) |
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