My Condolences Just Doesn't Cut It...

I wish that my father was alive, if only to ask him what he was going through when he was twenty-three.

I really think this is a good age to live life: our incomes are significantly greater than our responsibilities; change is still that sexy stranger; the future is bright enough to shed light on the past; and love, love is not yet boring.

But this is also the age of anxiety – a torturous, sleep-stealing anxiety that will just not go away. It hides in everything we deal with; often disguising itself as excitement until we realize that the masquerade was all our own making. I tell a friend of mine to stop preempting forever, because it will happen on its own. What exactly did I mean by that? When I was (we were) in college, any idiot could get laid for being spontaneous. Now it seems that permanence and stability are the most sought-after values. Permanence and stability – what has the world come to?

My mother says that I’m my father’s son (I was like, “Really? Thank God then…”). Seriously, she tells me that I have his walk (swagger), authority (arrogance), love for the written word and music (cultural elitism), and respect for the primacy of the moment (a blunt refusal to consider the future). She says that we both have the resiliency to overcome all obstacles to our goals (Yeah? I wonder what kind of obstacles a prominent Tausug scion faced…) and that we always seemed to be in control of the situation (the key word being “seemed”).

There are more parallelisms. My father changed his surname from Baginda, a name associated with his father and clan, to Asama, his mother’s maiden name (it means “Lion”, how cool is that?). Mine was changed from Baginda Ibn Asama (a name that screams “muslim terrorist”) to Valdez (they even added Angelo to complete the Christian effect). Hell, they even changed my given name from the imposing "Muhammad Jafar" to the wussy "Jeffrey". My father changed his name to cement his hatred of his own father onto what people would call him everyday. It was as if he cherished his hate and wanted to be constantly reminded of it. My mother’s family changed mine because they thought it would give me a better chance at a decent life. In hindsight, I cannot find the heart to balme them.

I was suddenly reminded of my father not being here anymore by someone’s grief at the loss of her mother. I mean, my father died when I was four – I just remember him as this tall bald man who didn’t speak Tagalog, who got me the wrong Transformers set (I wanted the Aerobots and I got the Insecticons!). I wanted so badly to say something wise and profound about my friend’s loss but I couldn’t think of any, and I wouldn’t be surprised if I came across as apathetic. I am not. I have lost so many things that meant so much to me, enough for me to know loss like a lover. Perhaps I was too scared to put into words the gravity of her loss. No eloquence could do justice to a person’s pain at the passing of her mother. Still, I want to give it a try…

My father’s remains lie at the Muslim Cemetery in Zamboanga City. I find this extremely ironic. His image strikes me as someone who believes that when people die, they’re gone. Nothing is left but our memories of them. Perhaps the influence of his two Christian wives put him in a grave. Growing up, I believed without anyone telling me that my father was cremated and that his ashes were in the bronze jar that we took home from Zambo when he died. I just assumed it. I didn’t realize until my maternal grandmother (who will forever be my favorite person in the world) died the reason why my father was buried. We just can't reconcile the fact that people go away. I started making up my own personal heaven specifically for my grandmother and that’s where I know she is right now. She lives in my heart forever.

It took me twenty-three years Pa -- and the friendship of a beautiful, amazing woman -- but now I finally acknowledge that I could certainly use a father like you.