Christmas is.

Merry Christmas to all our readers!

* * *

CEBU – This is a season not only of giving and receiving gifts, but more importantly also of thanksgiving to all those who made our year.

In this career that I have chosen, I come across various people both pleasant and obnoxious, but then I always believe that no matter how much sadness or hurt one brings into your life there is a purpose for such.

In sports, you feel sad when your team loses. You feel bad when your country earns no medal in the Olympics. You cry when your favorite football team loses in the major tournament.

You get hurt when you play the game and then you get hurt even more in the healing process as you go through rehabilitation. Your pocket can hurt too, but then all the hurt in this world doesn’t mean it is a bad one. It can be good also, but you just have to look at it from more angles like the way you’d try to read the green before a putt or when you go around the pool table trying to find the correct angle to make your shot.

Then there are also the triumphs of your team, your personal accomplishments like losing the poundage that you targeted or running the 10-K a few seconds faster.

You probably rejoiced at the victories of your sporting idols and even rejoiced in the other milestones of their life.

So much for the rhetoric, please just allow me to thank some people who have made 2008 a wonderful year.

First of course to my family, who have been most tolerant of the job that I chose to have. Then to the bosses at The Freeman who have been very kind to continue giving me the opportunity to do something that I love.

Then to my Big Brothers, who are not only friends but are also family who are there in both good and bad times to congratulate, console and give advice.

I’d been to many doctors also to look after my health, which is usually what happens when you are almost 40 and realize that the recklessness of your youth are taking their toll.

To my ortho Dr. Tony San Juan; pain specialist Dr. Arniel Chua, who I have to visit in Bacolod for therapy; our family’s favorite physician Dr. Elizabeth Aguilar; my classmate/gastro Dr. Vicente Avanzado, Jr.; and most recently, the doctor who is helping me overcome the pain of my spine troubles, Dr. Laurence G. Lim of Sugbu Medical.

The list been growing, but thanks to all of you because it’s hard to enjoy life if you are not fit enough to do so. 

To my colleagues in The Freeman who have to be pushed, prodded, scolded, loved, hated, taught and many more so we can beat the deadlines, thanks also for making office life not a bore.

I’m sure there are many new things to explore in the coming year in terms of career and life, but then trying to look back at what had been will help make you a better person and more importantly keeps you in touch of where you came from.

No matter what difficulties we now face, let’s celebrate Christmas, not necessarily in a lavish way, but in a thankful way for what we have. By the way, the most important thing about this season is the reason why we are celebrating – the birth of our Savior Jesus Christ.

* * *

MILESTONES: I’d like to greet my brother Nereus David a happy birthday as he turns 37 years old today.

Birthday wishes also go to Lt. Col. Raul Jesus L. Caldez, my former squad leader, who turns a year older tomorrow as well as my classmate Rommel Anthony Asuncion of IPI.

More power to all of you! – THE FREEMAN