We all have secrets we wish no one would ever find out—impulsive decisions in our childhood, choices we staunchly fought for only to regret later, failure to listen to reason, weaknesses taken for granted by others.
Veda Bañez Alonso takes a while to answer when asked if she had raised her three sons as a hippie.
“Our friends are scared of you, dad.” My daughters told me that when I fetched them from school one day. I had commented that their friends would become quiet when I approached. I wondered why, because I get along well with people of all ages. I am generally considered intelligent, fun and friendly.
This morning, I got this insight as I watched the Benguet tayao dance, where a couple dances in a circle to the beat of drums and gongs. The man raises his arms toward the heavens while the woman keeps her arms folded and low, as a bird protects her chicks.
I don’t think I’ve ever felt a hotter summer than this one. Not so much because of the actual soaring temperatures, but rather the intense stress and hectic schedule of the ongoing campaign season for the national and local elections.
I woke up at 4:24 a.m. on Sunday, April 7, which was unnatural, since I had just gone to bed at 3:30 a.m.
My little boys have grown. As I watch my two sons sleep peacefully, I often say a prayer of thanks for the years we have gone through together. They have grown from lovable bundles of joy into endearing full-fledged teens. I love my boys tremendously, though they can be a handful at times.
To many, flying is a common activity, but to a group of children with special needs, it was all but a dream—until recently, when volunteer pilots from the Angeles City Flying Club (ACFC) turned this dream into reality for 40 kids from Chosen Children’s Village, Precious Community and SPED school in Angeles, Pampanga.
“Faster than a speeding bullet! More powerful than a locomotive! Able to leap tall buildings in a single bound! Look, up in the sky, it’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s Superman!” Those were the classic words that my siblings and I chanted each time the “Superman” cartoons aired on TV.
February 19 was not a good day to go paddling out to sea as Typhoon “Crising” threatened to hit Mindanao, bringing with it incessant rains as far north as Cebu. That morning, a book launch was afoot and the irony of a stormy day could not have been all lost, in that the book, “Akong Bugsay,” is about navigating that deep blue sea called “life”—be it pacific or tempest-tossed.
Of all the things I learned from my mother, I think the best and most valuable is the power of prayer. We go through trials, and everyone has his or her own way of dealing with life’s challenges—in our family, it has always been through prayers, whether in Mass, rosaries, novenas or at the Blessed Sacrament.
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