The thing about responsibilities (actual or perceived) is that no matter how hard you try to shirk them or pretend that they don't exist, and whatever perfectly legitimate and valid reasons you may have for doing so, is that they always have a way of catching up to you. Or in my case, I simply decided to just take them head on.
Let me preface this post with the disclaimer that this is not borne out of angst. It is more of a monologue than anything, a somewhat more public form of thinking out loud. Maybe I should leave this private, but what the hell. Maybe it will help someone in the throes of the same issues.
Anna's brother Vince came over late this morning to evaluate my brother's condition. The prognosis was as I expected. Unlike many members of my family, after his 2004 bout with death, I never really believed he would ever fully recover. In a gesture of blind faith or folk catholicism, I visited churches, chapels, cathedrals and religious shrines, prayed, and lit enough candles to produce enough soot to blacken the whitest church walls. Think of it as somewhat like buying a lottery ticket. Most people don't actually believe a hundred percent that they WILL win, but they still gamble on the off chance that they do.
Going over my brother's latest medical records, I found myself a bit dumbfounded that it has been seven years since the (second) incident. That does not go to say that I do not care, or that I live in a fictional bubble. Much to the contrary, (and I do not, in any way exaggerate when I say this) not a day goes by that I do not think about what to do, how life will be, and what I should be doing to prepare for the day when I will have to step up to the plate. However, I have only recently returned to the fold to play a relatively active part in my brother's life.
I learned about incident zero when an uncle, my dad's brother,
who I hate, by the way, texted (and then called) me while I was working on a final paper for one of my classes. I was in my senior year in college, I hated that uncle,
could not wait to get off the phone and get back to my paper, and I
detested the implication that it was somehow, for some reason, my fault.
There I was trying to make something out of my life, and this bastard
who knew nothing about me, and just plain knew nothing, was calling me
in the middle of my in-the-zone moment, lecturing me. To be fair, during
events like that, nothing the detested person says really registers as logical. I'm a fairly
smart person, and I can justify any emotion to myself. At that point, I
felt indignant, and I confirmed that I was right to be so. I got off the
phone, went out to have a cigarette, and went back to the road to graduation.
The first incident happened right after my college graduation. It was 2003, and I had just gotten a letter from the UP College of Law that I had passed the Law Aptitude Examination, and I had been scheduled to be interviewed sometime in the middle of April. Back then, I had blinders on, and getting into law school was my finish line. No one and nothing could derail me from my track. I went home, but I never stayed long. I always returned to the dorm with my friends. I figured that my presence would not really make a difference anyway. It was not like I had fairy dust or some magical power that could make my brother rise from his coma. My maternal family had also advised me not to linger, by which advice I justified my intent not to stay. And I never cried. Not once. At some point, I seriously pondered why I hadn't, and I could not give myself an answer. Life went on for me. I had saved up for a suit and shoes to wear to my law school interview, and I went with C to Makati one day to purchase the armor that would eventually become standard equipment for my chosen profession. The day of my interview, I was more concerned with getting into law school than with what was happening back home. I had that tucked into a little box at the back of my brain, neatly stacked into the compartment labeled, "To be dealt with at a later time". And I did, after I'd finished my interview and had lunch with C at Kamirori. As my luck would have it, my brother awoke from his coma shortly after that.
A little more than a year later, it happened again. By October of 2004, I had developed a fear of phonecalls. Back then, none of my relatives really called unless it was urgent, and every time my phone rang, my heart skipped a beat in a tiny half-second panic attack. I stared at the screen for a second, took a deep breath, and braced myself for the bad news, which it always was.
That morning, I was sleeping, not so comfortably, I might add, on my makeshift bed in the tiny fourth floor walk-up I shared with C. It was a few weeks into our freshman year in law school, and we were a mess, literally and figuratively. We spent endless nights sleepless, falling asleep on top of our piles of photocopied cases, and hanging on for dear life. My college boyfriend and I had also just had a horrendously bloody (NOT literally) breakup. Long story short, I wasn't in the best shape. When my phone rang, and I saw that it was my cousin, I knew it was bad news. Deep breath. Hello? I hung my head, threaded my fingers through my bed-messed hair, took a deep breath... Ok... I put down the phone, stared blankly into space for a few seconds, and went back to bed. Sleep was so difficult to come by those days, and I treasured those little pockets of rest when I could just figuratively hide under a rock. So I again folded up the news I'd just been told and shelved it. When I woke up, I told C the news. And then I went back to my cases.
When my brother got out of the hospital, I went home to visit. It was frustrating, and frankly, too emotional, which I neither relish nor look forward to. He could hardly speak, and I could sense his frustration. And I cried. And I don't particularly like exercising my tear ducts. I decided I simply could not deal with the situation at that time, and anyway, there was really nothing I could do. Stop. Wash. Rinse. Repeat. Fold. Compartmentalize. Ok, ready. Again, life, and law school went on for me.
It was many months later that I would return for a visit with some of my cousins. Again, too emotional. My brother and I never really liked my dad's relatives, and there he was stuck with them for lack of any other option. He wanted to go with us, but we couldn't take him. Too emotional. Can't deal. Stop. Wash. Rinse. Repeat. Fold. Compartmentalize. Ok, ready.
This happened every single time I went home. And it was always just for a few hours. I feared for my sanity too much to linger any longer.
And so life went on. Four years of law school, six months of bar review, a month of taking the bar. And then I offered my soul on the altar of law firm life. Whatever life that was. I hated it. I took every escape hatch I could. I went to my aunt's house in Baguio A LOT. At that point, my relationship with one of my cousins had soured so much that I just skipped going to Laguna altogether. Scratch that option. Also could not deal with what was happening back home. Scratch that option too. Since I wanted to get away from the city, that left Baguio. It was an expensive lifestyle that I felt was necessary for my sanity. Work was just about all I could deal with at that point. Two and a half years later, I'd had enough. I resigned from the firm and prepared to move to a less stressful job in the civil service.
It has been a year and a half since I joined the civil service. One might ask why I still had not dealt with the situation prior to this point. Well, first, I'd simply gotten so used to shelving it that I'd gotten comfortable doing so. Second, I really don't get along with my dad's relatives. I simply do not like them. And third, going back just brought back so many bad memories that I wasn't prepared to deal with. I did start getting my finances in order, in case I predecease my brother. (Yeah, I know, how mature of me. Whatever.) I've managed to achieve some semblance of financial order. Not much, but I'm at a relatively stable financial place right now. And I'm comfortable enough to discuss these things with A as I did with C. It's not exactly the easiest topic to broach with people. In fact, I've only told the closest members of the inner circle. Also, since Vince is leaving for Singapore on Monday, I had to fast-track things a little.
So now comes this prognosis. Now I know I really have to prepare. I have a few years to get everything in order before I have to take the reins. I sincerely hope I can do this, because frankly, I don't have a choice. Unlike some people, I do not see voluntary la muerte as an escape hatch. Don't take this the wrong way, I'm not a naturally altruistic person. In fact, I characterize myself as more selfish than selfless, in spite of all the spur of the moment charitable donations I end up making. I still detest that I have to do this, when I should just be concentrating on planning my career, and that trip to Europe I've been dreaming of since I was a pre-adolescent child. It was irresponsible of my brother to do what he did, consequences be damned, and now I have to suffer for it. I really detest people who don't know their place in the world, that there are certain unbreakable societal mores and rules, and that there is a time and a place for everything. Apparently, it's a fairly common occurrence for people, particularly those related to me, to NOT understand this concept. Ah yes, now I remember why I resigned from family duties. C'est la vie.
