Shutting down ... or not ...

29 November 2008. Some sympathize, some pray, and some wants me to shut up, to shut down the blog. Sure, shutting down the blog was something I wish for, it would mean closure on my part - a new start, a fresh start, saying good bye to tears, hopelessness, the darkness within.

In my last entry, I succumbed to the goodness of my mother. I sent something for my father and again at her request, another gift. I thought healing would start, that there would be no more need for the blog, for me to write. My mother was wrong and I was likewise wrong to hope. Old dogs do find it hard to learn new tricks. Worst, for someone to resort to old tricks such as wife battery.

I was in San Francisco attending a workshop training, happy to talk with colleagues and to feel happiness even for a while. Living in Caracas, Venezuela was a bit lonely and stressful, and that I guess is the price one has to pay to earn better for one´s family. My sister in law was not straigthforward - she just said my brother wants to talk to me, but that was more than enough for me to sense that something was wrong, something was amiss. Truth would always come out. Secrets are so easily spoiled.

My Mom is 67, she came home to Pasay City with bruises and a black eye. As before, she tried to go home to Cabuyao, Laguna - to hide from us the sad truth of my father´s temperament, she called Tita Millet who not knowing fully well her situation excused herself having to take care of her grandchildren. She was forced to come home - and thus my brother came to know. Me, they decided not to tell, so I would not worry, so as not to bother me - good intention, but the worst harm comes from the best intention.

I cried on the phone, in the bathroom, and then to a friend´s shoulders. My eyes hurt from the tears but they would never be enough. I cry not from worry, my brother would protect my Mom, which is what they text me now. I cry for I am not there to be with my Mom, I am so far away, feeling so useless, unable to comfort her.

I cry out of sadness. I had hoped, together with my Mom´s wishes - things would be better. Part of me was pessimistic, part of me wanted a legal battle way back in 2006, I guess I was right that we should have parted ways and have divided the properties way back then. But being right does not make me feel good, sometimes I wish I am wrong.

Fellowship night of the training workshop - I excluded myself. My maternal cousin and my mother´s eldest sibling, Ninang Tud came all the way from Sacramento to San Francisco. It was so difficult holding back the tears. Been a decade since I saw Ninang Tud, her papers are still in process so she cannot go home right now. They had heard but would not want to tell me, I could not blame them. My paternal relatives hid the truth from me for almost 20 years!!

The truth hurts, it is sometimes so unbearable but I would rather know than live in blissful ignorance. Knowing something gives me the option to think, to consider alternative courses of action - this is better than not doing anything, for not knowing anything at all.

The blog stays.. the blog lives ... and this blog will see the triumph of my family against the wicked ways of my father, his mistress, his mistress´s childen, and my likewise, the evil followers cousin of my father (blood suckers all of them!)