My first recollection of my Tita Belen was when I was probably about three.Funny but this memory was so well etched in my mind and it remains one of the lasting memories of my childhood. I was carried up by somebody I dont really know who to look at the coffin of my sleeping cousin Gerrybel in her white coffin. My cousin died in her childhood and she was the prettiest of all of us. I could recall my Tita Belen sitting near the coffin and everybody around her was talking about Gerrybel and how pretty she was and how she died because of her tonsils. This memory really made me shun eating popsicles and anything sweet when I was young for fear of having tonsils and have a fever and die young.
(my Tita Belen & cousin Genette)
Flashback a few years later, I remember my mom buying us new bell bottom pants which was in fashion at that time and my Tita Belen visiting us from Lucena. I saw my Tita Belen asking my mother to show her our bell bottoms and she went to work with her pencil and a long paper and sketched the outline of the bell bottom pants. Eventually I saw my cousins Genette and Gerrylen wearing beautiful bell bottom pants much prettier than ours and all lovingly sewn by my Tita Belen.
Whenever we visit her in Lucena which was usually during summers, my memories are full of my Tita Belen and of my Lola Bebing bringing us to pick mangoes in her farm and my Tita Baby serving us austere breakfast telling us that we must eat all what is on our plate since a lot of children are dying of hunger.
My Tita Belen is my moms eldest sister and my ninangand what I know about her is that she was the last to get married marrying at the age of 35 years old which in the 50s was close to spinsterhood. She proved to be the model of austerity ,honesty, "coolness" meaning I had never heard her scream or get angry. She always spoke in a low sweet voice as if she was humming you to sleep.My Tita Belen and Tita Baby loved to bake cakes and make leche flan from gulaman .They also loved to sew colorful drapes and curtains for their home in Lucena. If there was ever a Martha Stewart in the family , it is my Tita Belen and Tita Baby was her lady in waiting.
My mother always told me that I got my thriftiness from my Tita Belen .I dont really know what she meant by that since I am not really that thrifty maybe she thought since I rarely buy clothes and if ever I always wear the same clothes over and over again then maybe she was right I was thrifty alright.
My Tita Belen led a very disciplined life in her 70s she was still brisk walking with her neighbors in San Jose,California and she was very careful with her diet.
Probably the last long talk I had with my Tita Belen was about 6 years ago when I visited her in San Francisco with Tony. At that time I just woke up and I found their house in San Jose quiet since all the 3 boys of my cousin Genette and Richard Olalia where either in school in UC Davis or in a sleep over. When I went inside Tita Belens room I noticed the photos inside her room and a letter tucked in one of the photo frames. She handed me the letter and she said it came from Mike(Jammy),the eldeat son of Genette and Richard and the eldest apo.
When I read the letter I was close to tears specially when Tita Belen told me so proudly that Mike was able to enter a very good school UC Davis. In the letter(if my memory doesnt fail me yet) Mike wrote about how his Lola(Tita Belen) will always be there to wipe his tears away whenever he tumbles and falls and how he was taken cared off when he was still very young.
I know how much my Tita is so well loved by everyone in our family and we will surely miss her. This is in memory of my mothers sister, everyone's tita and my ninang
Close your eyes and wish for the one thing
You cannot do without, and when you do,
Near your heart you'll find it, always there,
Treasure that is dear but not so rare,
Held in the mesh that all your dreams flow through.
In truth, no gift more happiness spring,
than a mothers love so rarely brings
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