Iza spends her first blue Christmas without her father

Through the years

We all will be together

If the fates allow... — from Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas, sung for the first time by Judy Garland in Meet Me in St. Louis

Unfortunately for Iza Calzado and others in a similar situation, fates didn’t allow her to spend Christmas this year with her father, director-choreographer Lito Calzado, who lost his year-old battle with liver cancer last month. Iza will have a blue Christmas (made even bluer by the fact that she broke up with her businessman-boyfriend earlier this year) for the first time now that she’s a complete orphan. Her mother also succumbed to cancer a decade ago.

“Even if you knew that your loved one was dying,” Iza told Funfare after the presscon for Imus Productions/GMA Films’ Carlo J. Caparas’ Ang Panday 2 where she’s one of Bong Revilla’s leading ladies, “when he would finally go, masakit pa rin; it still shocked.”

Friends who have lost loved ones advised Iza to be prepared for a lifetime grieving, saying, “You will never get over; you just have to learn to live with it.” You see, the longer it takes, the more intense the longing becomes, the more you miss the one who’s gone.

“Little things remind me of him,” said Iza. “The other night, I was watching a video clip of dancers and I told myself, ‘Ay, pinakita ko ang video na ‘to kay Daddy before; ngayon, hindi ko na maipapakita sa kanya ang video na ‘yon.’ And that’s when I start missing him. Yes, I know that life has to go on, that you have to move on, but you can’t help looking back especially when things remind me of him, like that dance video.”

In past Christmases, Iza and Dad Lito usually observed a certain ritual.

“Almost every year kasi, I would have a Metro Filmfest entry so I would join the Parade of Stars (held on Dec. 24) and my dad would be with me. After the parade, we would hear Mass and then eat out. I will still be doing that with my (only) brother but we will surely miss our dad. On Christmas Day, we would have reunions first with my dad’s relatives and then with my mom’s relatives. We’ll still do that and the only difference is that our dad won’t be with us anymore.”

and with her late dad, director-choreographer Lito Calzado

Since Iza has been living independently for 10 years now, she’ll be spared missing Dad Lito on a daily basis — “You know, I would miss him, all right, but in a different way, unlike kung kasama mo sa bahay na you would imagine how he lived every moment of the day. But even if we lived apart, we had regular communication and we saw each other as often as we could.”

Iza never made any decision, no matter how small, without first consulting her father.

“He was always there to remind me about everything…about my career, about my personal life. He was very particular about professionalism and about giving your all to every project. Recently, I had to make a decision and my first impulse was to call my dad. Then, I would realize that he’s gone and that’s when I again get that I-wish-he-were-here feeling. Wala na akong sumbungan. Kasi ang dad ko, minsan matampuhin ‘yon. When he felt na nasasaktan ako at hindi ko sinasabi sa kanya, nagtatampo na ‘yan. Sometimes I would scold him for making a big fuss about something na napakaliit na bagay para sa akin.”

Lito went into a coma only during his last several hours. Two days before he died, Iza, who was just recovering from a bad case of flu, saw him.

“We didn’t expect him to go that soon; akala namin he would last for two weeks pa. It was as if he simply decided, ‘Ayoko na. I will go na.’ That fast. Since he was uncomfortable discussing details about himself, I never talked to him about, you know, the kind of funeral that he wanted, etc. He was intubated and although he was in pain, he struggled and said ‘I love you!’ to me. That was his last words to me.”

Iza and his brother buried Lito’s remains beside those of their mom at Himlayang Pilipino.

That’s where they are going to spend the early hours of Christmas this year.

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