To My Nathan

You changed my life and how.

You are changing the way I look at mornings. I am usually up at 4:30AM, would do my morning ‘prayer time’, would reflect while sipping coffee afterwards, would take a quick shower, dress up and attend Morning Mass. If there’s time (or if the Presiding Priest is Fr. Robert), I would sprint or do some yoga poses. After Mass, visit the Adoration Chapel, have breakfast, read the papers or catch the news on TV, then take a long bath, dress up and go to work. But when you came, everything is juggled. You have become my alarm clock, your wailing is far more ‘alarming’ and would rouse even a dragon from deep slumber. My prayer time is longer as you have become part of my litany. I don’t jog anymore before Mass and make sure I would run back home after a very short visit at the Adoration Chapel. I want to be there at 6:30AM, your sun bathing time. I would carry you, I would talk to you, I would sing to you Our Father, Minsan Lang Kita Iibigin, and ABC. I would just stare, I would just sit there. I would whisper I love you, I would say a prayer for you. Until I would realize I am already late for work.

You are changing the way I appreciate sunshine. Your pedia said you were yellowish and the lab test proved that --- and we all panicked. You had to undergo ‘phototherapy’, you had to be confined. After your agonizing hospital stay, we all had to do some sun dancing just to ask the Mighty Sun to come out. We all had to stare up the sky, shoo away those nasty clouds, and we even wrote Anne Curtis to stop singing so the ‘low pressure area’ would just go away. We all had to wait for the precious sunshine, my dear Nathan. And when it finally rose, we both laughed and cried. We raised you like an offering, we let you touch the sun like you were Simba. Indeed, it’s your time to shine. 

You are changing the way I feel. I was never been demonstrative about my feelings. I never share, I never open up, I never talk about my personal drama. Sure, I write. But I never express. Sure, I share my blogs. But I never really sit down and tell anyone about my life story.  Sure I vent out through shout outs and status posts. But I never really showed what’s inside me. I have kept everything, my hurt, my angst, my pain --- even my joys --- to myself. But you changed all that, my dear Nathan. I am no longer afraid to show my true colors. And I am happier this way.

Perhaps, it has something to do with how you wail; you’re like a fireball, red and furious. Perhaps, it’s the way you smile. Or it’s the way you raise your fingers to touch my hand. Perhaps, it has something to do with how your eyes glisten or how you fart like a big fat boy. Perhaps, it’s how you kick during feeding time or how you become all still and quiet when I sing to you Our Father, Minsan Lang Kita Iibigin and ABC. It’s all that my dear Nathan, how you show me your feelings, how you express yourself. You are so trusting, you are so open, you are so demonstrative. You make me believe I could be all that. That I could be happier that way.

You are changing the way I am living my life. Like it’s my first day-last day. Like it’s always brand new, every morning I wake up is a blessing, every night I sleep I surrender to Him. Like I am not carrying a cross, no more pain and sorrows, even those I have surrendered to Him. Like time is not ticking away, because every minute is dedicated to you; I swear the best of my time, the rest of life is all for you.

Your birthday March 11 was an auspicious day for both of us. It was the day your life started and my whole life has changed.