mango season
Manila, 6 April—When she was still alive, our mother loved mangoes. I remember how, when we were younger, her business trips would take her to Cebu and she would come home afterwards with boxes and boxes of mangoes and derivative items: Dried mangoes, mango candies, and mango puree from 7D, plus boxes more of Shamrock Otap.
These trips were often, and this meant she was often out of the house for days on end, but they also meant that there would be mangoes. I remember spending summers just gorging on them, my hands sticky and yellow; sometimes I ate so much I got rashes. Still, my mother kept serving mangoes after every meal, warning about the scratchy bottom portions and watching us fight over who got the fatter liso (that center piece).
Sometimes, when my sister got picky, our mother would slice the flesh from the mango cheeks into cubes; sometimes, she would ball them up with rice and line them up in my sister’s plate. I thought this was weird until I got served the exact same thing in a Thai restaurant, many many years later. My sister maybe was 5 or 6; that would have made my mother the same age as I am today.
These days, I catch myself wondering often about my mother’s could-have-beens—like, did she ever go abroad at all, for example? Back in the day, when there were no cheaper airfares and seat sales, no smartphones and Instagram, no MRT or P2P, no Skyway or SCTEX even—did she ever think about going places? Apart from Cebu and Leyte, I mean—the islands where she grew up? Did she use to look ahead thinking one day we’d be old enough for travel that wasn’t fussy and complicated, the way children who are under 12 are complicated? I don’t think I can travel with young children on my own, much less two of them.
It has always been a sadness for me that my mother did not live long enough to enjoy any of these things: Instant messaging and video calls, Agoda and AirBnb, Netflix and Waze. She would have loved them. My mother was a big fan of mobile phones; the first one I ever saw was in a bag that lived mostly inside our car. I still remember its prefix: Its number began with 0977. Man, how she would have loved an iPhone.
But mostly it saddens me that she did not live long enough to enjoy the fruits of her hard work where her children and family are concerned; that she did not live long enough to enjoy the pleasure of my adult company, maybe—one that does not get lost staring at mirrors in the middle of a Gaisano mall as a 3-year-old, as I did during my first time in Cebu.
By now our mother has been dead for 21 years—a full adult lifetime, if anything. I think about her every day, especially when I travel to Cebu for work, or when I travel at all. I like to think that by keeping her in my thoughts, she is always with me wherever I go.
Death and my mother go hand-in-hand, and mostly, when confronted with death, I go back to my mother. I go back to her again because earlier this week, someone young died. And while I didn’t know him personally, I have many friends who did. As it would turn out, he was diagnosed with depression at around the same time I was. And now, just like that, he is gone.
It’s been hard for everyone, because it hits close to home; every time someone who once lived with mental illness dies, it does.
Much has been said about a video of him that circulated days after his death, but I am sharing just this one by Inquirer columnist and grief expert Cathy Babao. Tl;dr: Medication works for some people, and if resources permit, it’s still best to seek a doctor’s help.
Today I sat down with good friends for a long and lovely talk over breakfast, and I went home to my girlfriend to nap before finishing (finally) our re-watch of Season 5 of Game of Thrones. Yesterday, I was able to attend the christening of my second godson from the Atienzas, marked a good friend’s birthday, and ate good food in honor of St Vincent, who was celebrating his feast day.
Whenever the going gets dark, I think about all the good I’m about to do with all these people, and all the growing up I will see, and all the good dogs and cats I will heart on Instagram. This morning while talking we realized that there’s no One Way to do it; every person’s needs are different, and that is precisely why we have to keep listening. The effort does not have to be perfect; it just has to be there.
Related reading:
I am not always very attached to being alive via The Outline. For me, “passive suicide ideation” was not a thing until my psychiatrist told me that was the term for what I thought was the most alarming of my symptoms.
When they leave via Medium.
Here when you need me, xo.