The Gonzalez family is interestingly complex. Five generations ago a Gonzalez family lived across the church at Baliwag, Bulacan. One of the daughters was known to be ahead of her time. She managed her father’s lands. She rode a white horse. That may be truth or myth. She was known to have had an indiscretion with the friar across the street. For the longest time I thought they had one child, a son, my great-grandfather. But reading the family history I discovered they had six children, therefore, minimally they had six indiscretions. The children carried her family name because they could not carry his. If they could have, then we would be surnamed Lopez.
My great-grandfather married and settled in Sulipan. They had 10 sons. Among them my grandfather Javier, who was a successful lawyer who died young, and his brother Bienvenido, who later became president of the University of the Philippines, who was the father of my Tita Lil.
My grandfather Javier died in his middle thirties. His brokenhearted wife died two years later. They left nine children who were parceled off. Tito Ben and my father, Vladimir, went to Bienvenido, or my Lolo Bindo.
My father was killed by the Japanese when I was six months old. At least once a year my mother and I would have lunch with Lolo Bindo, Lola Conching and their family – Tito Nol, who became my confirmation godfather; Tito Zal, who walked me down the aisle on my wedding day, taking the place of my father; Tita Eva, Tita Lilia and Tito Dodong.
Every year Tito Nol would stand me by a post and make a mark so we could see how tall I had become since my last visit. I was a very quiet, shy child, but very observant. I listened well and observed much.
Then life happened. As I met my first cousins, grandchildren of Javier, and got to know his descendants better, I realized that maybe, just maybe, of all the Gonzalezes we were the mavericks. Most of my father’s brothers and sisters had married more than once. When I was doing research for my book How Do You Know Your Pearls Are Real? I found that children who were orphaned young tended to grow up promiscuous as an offshoot of being deprived of their parents. That explained my aunts and uncles, my cousins and me, to me.
The family of Lolo Bindo, however, was very conservative. My mom believed that Lola Conching, his wife, frowned upon my mother leaving red lipstick marks on her linen napkins. Tita Eva and Tita Lil remained single all their lives. Tito Nol married Tita Esther and had three children; Tito Zal married Tita Pacita late and had one child; Tito Dodong married and had two children. And I guess as an occasional sidecar, they have me. I love them because they were part of my childhood. I remember at the last big family reunion getting up to join the grandchildren’s photo session because I felt I was a small part of their family.
It was Lolo Bindo who told me to remember that our family name was spelled with two Zs. Doble zeta! One day he called my mother to invite her to his 60th birthday party. “I made it to 60,†he said, “very rare for a Gonzalez male.†I don’t remember what month his birthday was but he died on Dec. 30, before his 60th year was over.
Time passed. We all grew old. I would see them once in a while. Tita Lil always made it a point to find me in the Legazpi market when I was selling there. When I had art exhibits, they always bought paintings. At Christmas they called to order jewelry from me. We have become better friends now that we are all old.
Last Sunday when it was pouring rain I received text telling me that Tita Lil had passed away. I felt so sad. She was a sweet lady, always seeing that things were there when they were needed. She supervised the food, ensuring that they were prepared without garlic and onions to suit everybody’s allergies.
At her wake her choral group, the Chorus Paulinus, always sang at the mass and at the burial. They loved her like a mother and she was like a mother to them, seeing to their food at rehearsals, making them sleep there whenever necessary. Father Arnold Zamora, a priest who was once the choral director, flew in from the US to say the last mass for her and the last blessing. He will fly back on Friday. What a grand gesture!
Tita Lil had a simple but a blessed life. I know her little family will miss her. We will all miss her.
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