One fine night, my son Gio unexpectedly asked me “would you be willing to accompany me in a 4k race?” I hid my excitement and replied “of course I would be more than willing. But isn’t there a longer distance, perhaps a 10k?” My son immediately informed me that there was only 1 category and no other options.
A few minutes later, he asked for my Credit Card. To my bewilderment, we were joining the Pokemon Run in Taiwan! Too late to back out now. I already consented to his wish.
And so we flew to Taiwan and arrived late at night. Woke up the following day and walked 4.5km to the venue. A festive atmosphere filled the grounds, families with babies, toddlers and children enjoying the Pokemon-inspired exhibits.
I will spare you with the details and go directly to the gist of this story.
We headed to the airport in the afternoon, boarded the plane and arrived late at night in Vietnam.
We again boarded the plane in the morning and headed to Bali, where we stayed for 2 nights. In going back to Manila, we stopped over first in Singapore.
So to summarize, we flew to 5 countries in 5 days. This may be a natural occurrence to some people but definitely NOT with me!
To be continued . . .
My mother has always been athletic. She was a volleyball spiker in her teens. A tennis player in her twenties. A golfer in her thirties. A bowler in her forties. And she did not just play for recreation. She religiously trained and played to win in competitions, usually reaching the Championships.
I have often wondered where she got all that energy, when she barely eats! She has no favorite food and her motto is “I only eat inorder to live.” Yup. That is my mother—eating only so she could perform her daily activities. She doesn’t eat junk foods nor drink alcohol. A little rice and lots of veggies used to be her food staple.
When people ask her what is her secret for maintaining her 36-27-36 figure she would answer in jest “I cannot maintain my production so I just maintain my figure”. When interviewed what is her secret for not having any maintenance meds, she would boastfully reply—“I am NOT a car. I don’t need maintenance. Just have enough food, enough sleep, enough exercise, enough rest, enough stress, and enough money to last a lifetime.”
My mother is the epitome of clean, healthy living. Yet she could not escape the illness that flows through the veins of her lineage. Last year, she was medically diagnosed to have Alzheimer’s Disease. (My tears are flowing while I am writing this.)
With her failing memory, she instructed me to invite anyone who was still excited to see her on her 90th birthday. Attended by 120 friends, relatives, former Philamlifers, Marbeleños, villagemates, her birthday bash was a Reunion of sorts. Filled with laughter and tears, it was an event no other.
To be continued . . .
Today is the 67th birthday of my First Love. I am talking about a real person—not Coca-Cola, which I loosely refer to as my “First Love”.
I was 9 when I wrote in my diary that I would never marry anyone except this guy who gave me the reason to go to school every morning. We were in 3rd Grade when he transferred from Iloilo to our school.
You see I was bullied since Grade 1. By someone untouchable in our school—the son of our Principal. There were days when I would drag my feet to go to school when I already anticipated what will happen in class. It has always been the same troublesome scenario. This boy would tirelessly tease me to death that I begged my mother to enroll me in Judo-Karate so I could beat him mercilessly heheheh . . .
Everything changed when the boy from Iloilo joined our class. I would jump out of bed in excitement to see him. My attention was diverted to him and nothing else mattered anymore. He turned my world from dull grey to flaming red, sunny yellow, cool blue, refreshing green and huggable pink! Whenever he speaks and call my name, it was beautiful music to my ears.
To my First Love, thank you for adding spice and color to my young life. I thank God that we are still friends until now. I wish you good health, loving family, true friends, profitable business and personal peace. Enjoy your birthday celebration!
(For reactions/comments, you may email me at ndelr62@gmail.com.. Thanks for dropping by. Stay safe!)
My proudest moment: Finishing the Luneta to Tagaytay 60km Ultramarathon which garnered the biggest donation ever since I started my fund-raising advocacy for the Down Syndrome Assn. of the Phils. Inc. way back in 2008 when I joined a 5k race in celebration of my 50th birthday. It even surpassed my UP Diliman to UP Los Baños 80km Ultramarathon in 2018!
My generous friends probably thought that this was gonna be my last and final Ultra because I was already 66 when I attempted to run this for the third time. Or they most likely took pity on me because in 2023, we had to stop at km 47 and decided to go home. My Plantar Fasciitis was killing me then. But I vowed to redeem myself and I certainly did!
For the first time, I wasn’t the last to arrive at the FinishLine which was strategically located at the highest point of Palace in the Sky. 8 runners Did Not Start. 8 runners Did Not Finish. And drums roll please . . . 8 runners came after me!
Never mind if my toenails met their untimely demise after being soaked in water for 9 hours. We had to endure the pouring rain from 4AM until 1PM causing the agonizing death of my toenails but I was simply ecstatic arriving earlier at the FinishLine that I did not feel any pain at all!
My running buddy Ann joined me at Km 47 where we previously gave up and provided me the much-needed support until the very end. I am extremely grateful to her.
To be continued . . .