My own small life
The difference between being old and being young is what is important to you. News is no longer that important to me. In fact, it bores me. It is for young people who get fired up and enraged over what happens and decide to go to Luneta and walk. Been there, done that, I think. Now I am too old. I will do just what I like these days. There are two: preparing jewelry for my first bazaar, and teaching writing. That’s what I like to do.
I wake up early, go to the kitchen to brew my first and only cup of coffee for the day. Then, still in my nightgown, I go to my workroom, sit down at my work table cluttered with tools, beads, and all sorts of other things and wonder what I’m going to do today. See, I don’t know how to plan. I just know how to sit and do.
Before even I know it my hands are working, making either dramatic earrings, standout necklaces, or experimental bracelets. I keep doing this through the morning. I love that I don’t have to wash my face or brush my teeth or prepare breakfast for anybody else but me. I don’t have to comb my hair and look pretty. I can be working looking like a mess until around 11:30. Then I get up to heat my food, which I buy, cooked, from all sorts of places. Lately it’s been Salcedo market once again, until I get tired. While my food heats up in a steamer I bathe, get dressed, eat, brush my teeth, put on make up and go back to my worktable until my writing students arrive.
My writing students bring in big puffs of fresh air into my life. Over seven sessions I see them first as shy, then they open up until finally we are sitting, chatting, laughing together. They are friendlier, warmer than my own children sometimes. In the beginning I always write with them to build their confidence and to prove that even I have good and bad writing moments. When they have enough confidence I disappear into my workroom and do something there while they write.
In my classes you have to read what you write out loud so I can hear your voice.
On their fourth or fifth class their voices turn. They have learned how to write! This thrills me all the time. I burst with pride. I am proud of them for learning and proud of teaching them writing and bringing them to this point. We have finished their sixth class. Now everyone is preparing for graduation. Soon I will have no more writing classes but we will be running into the holidays so I need my time to make more fancy jewelry and join the single bazaar I’m preparing for. Remember I do this alone. I have no maids or assistants to help me.
Still there are people who text me to inquire about writing classes. I tell them sometime in January. They want to know when. I tell them I don’t know. You have to understand I am old, taking it easy, living life day by day. I don’t plan more than a month in advance. And I enjoy having this power over my own life immensely.
Besides, do you think I enjoy all the tricks people play on me regarding my writing classes? Quite a few of them say they will come and at the last minute, they don’t come. Some of them are all excited then suddenly a few classes down they have to drop out. But I don’t really mind. I still have jewelry to make and that I enjoy more than anything else because it only depends on me. I shop for it. I sit down and do it. I will sell it.
Actually I quite enjoy getting old. If you ask me how old I feel, I would say about 28, until my eyeglasses start to slip and I realize I have to clean them. And that I need them when once I had the clearest of eyes. But once you hit 40, suddenly you need glasses and it’s downhill from there. My lenses are progressive – up for distance, middle for computer work and low for jewelry. But no lines. You get used to it only they’re expensive. You have to budget for your glasses as you grow older.
I get up and suddenly getting up is not so easy but once I start to walk I am fine. I feel 28 again. Forgive me. I am getting old, having senior moments, but otherwise I am very happy because I have full authority over my own small life. That’s great!
* * *
Please text your comments to 0917-8155570.
