Letter No. 13

My age didn't hang over my head till now. Till now, I was "20-something," figuring it out, taking my time, planning only as far as a year in advance. But last year, the year I turned 25, everything seemed to happen all at once. Or rather, the worries that simmered at the back of my mind all started to bubble and whistle louder for attention.

This isn't the first time I've written about my family getting older or the rest of my life being ahead of me, but this is the first time in years that I can remember feeling seriously pressured to do something about it. "When will I have apo?" sounds a lot more urgent now than it did when I was 20. So do, "What are you going to do with your career?", "When are you coming home again?", and "So, are you [two] next?"

I don't want to have ready answers to these questions just because other people are asking them. I keep fending them off with, "It's early," and "There's still time," but they've gotten deeper under my skin somehow.

I think the biggest thing that bothers me is having — or rather, not yet having children. Since the start of the year, it's like the universe has dispatched a pro-use-your-uterus front against me: my mom, my brother, a trend in articles against motherhood after 30, couples mentioning their future children in their wedding vows, people at weddings asking about my own plans, and Metro Manila's bottomless supply of adorable infants and toddlers in public places.

Sometimes, their attacks are combined. At Ba Noi's on Ken's last night in town, he, Cris, and I saw one wide-eyed infant boy getting handed from one person to another at the next table. Ken piped up, "So, do you guys want kids?" And after a long, "Uh — " from me, he backpedalled with, "I ask the couple that's been together nine months," but it was too late; the awkward bomb had dropped. Just last Saturday, one little stinker I nicknamed "Dumpling Baby" entertained me and Cris through the wedding ceremony of his friend.

The other day, I had kind of an emotional response to one blog I've been following. I followed dover/Callai after reading some of her posts on an American freethinkers' blog, at around the time she and her husband Andrew were just thinking of having children. It's been a few years since then, and Callai and Andrew now have Eleanor, a lovely, funny, clever near-two-year-old whose face just brightens up your screen and your day. But it was the moment they took the plunge and decided to have her that really got me hooked on dover's blog.

In the post I responded to, dover related how she felt like an odd one out at a recent meeting with her peers. She was the only 20-something in her book club who'd decided to be a stay-at-home mom, and she expressed discomfort at being seen by the other women as a big "What if...?"

But I'd be lying if I didn't say that her blog hasn't given me that "What if...?" since I started following it. We're around the same age, have similar social backgrounds, and ask ourselves a lot of questions about where our lives are going. And I also wanted to have kids that young. Through dover's blog posts about pregnancy, childbirth, and childrearing, I've gotten to imagine what my life would have been like if I'd had my own dumpling baby, instead of working till I landed backwards into a comfortable job and started entertaining thoughts about further studies.

She occasionally reads my own posts, so dover, if you're reading this, I hope you don't feel bad. You and your growing family are an inspiration to someone here across the Pacific, and I wish you, Andrew, Eleanor, and whoever's next all the best. I am happy for you and, often, jealous.

Anyway, in my own Tumblr post, I ranted a little bit about how sad it is that career and motherhood still seems like an either-or thing. I was thinking of this article about the pending global population decline, and I was mad that it "blamed" educating girls for the fact that fewer women are having fewer kids at the best reproductive age. But after the post, I realized that it had never been an either-or thing for me. I'd said it myself: the opportunity to have kids had never presented itself. And now, I'm 25.

God. You know what 25 for me feels like? It feels early and late all at once. Late because I wanted kids for a long time, and two years ago, I was in a relationship with someone I thought I'd have those kids with. Early because I can't even write my boyfriend's name into this sentence because I'm afraid of scaring him off, because I have no fucking clue if or when it's safe to move past admiring other people's babies to talking, really talking and really thinking (again) about having one.

(I mean, never mind the fact that I want two.)

Dwelling

Me at a recent college reunion. That's my old friend Edwin in the background.

I love my short hair, even on the days it sticks up in the back or falls limp into my face and makes me look like a small boy. It's actually made me more comfortable with my general lack of femininity, or just my aversion to all things to do with looking anything like this:

The Stepford Wives (2004, Paramount Pictures)

It also has the strange effect of making me feel even girlier whenever I do wear a skirt or dress.

I suddenly understand why the girls on America's Next Top Model cry in pain whenever they get drastic haircuts, only in my case, it was a drastic haircut that helped me to feel stronger. In getting my hair cut, I've pulled on the still-strange armor of being all myself.

--

I'm finally free to move out of Cubao. I thought this day would never come, but here I am, browsing listings and checking commute routes.

I'm planning to move to Makati because the neighborhood's nicer, but the length of the commute and the fact that I'll be heading for Quezon City 5-6 times a week gives me second thoughts. The main reason I had for choosing Makati was that my brother may decide to share the apartment at any time, and it would actually be more convenient for the both of us if I moved south than if he moved north. I just hope the commute doesn't wear me down all that much.

I was thinking of moving to Ermita, just for the proximity to so many things of historical interest. It had been one dream when I was still in college imagining the fantastic life I would have in my 20s, and I learned the other year that it was just one long ride to the office (compared with the two or three rides I'd take from almost anywhere else). Sadly, my friends who actually live in Ermita say that it's noisy, crowded, polluted, and flood-prone; if they had a choice, they'd live elsewhere.

Cubao has turned me off to the idea of Quezon City in general. While Katipunan and probably Teacher's Village may prove to be the exceptions, I'm kind of annoyed by the kids who go to my alma mater today and would rather not be surrounded by them at the end of a long day. Yep, I've become one of those cranky alumnae who think the lower batches are out of their minds.

Where else? The area around my office is actually not so bad, but I would actually like some physical distance from work.

So, Makati it is, I guess.

Things I am looking forward to getting: a new mattress (the one I have has been bleeding foam for months, and not in easy-to-restuff chunks, but in particles), more bookshelves, a bigger cabinet, and a table and chairs. In my current cramped space, I work on the bed and eat on the floor, surrounded by books and piles of clothes.

Young middle-class problems.

Conditioning

I'm growing out my hair. I wanted an important, personal reason to do it--not just, "I want to see how long it can get before I get tired ofit," or "I don't really trust salons anymore"--but while trying to figure out why, it grew anyway.

"I want a different look."

"It's never been gotten longer than this before. I want to see what's
so great about long hair."

"I don't know what else to do with it."

"I'm waiting for the right time to make a big announcement."

"People at work say it'll suit me."

"I'm waiting for Martin's crutches to go back into storage."

"I've gotten used to hiding behind it."

"I'm belatedly fulfilling the wishes of the guys I hung out with in college."

"I need something that reflects the passage of time, because nothing
else in my life is so constant."

"It makes me feel pretty."

"It makes me feel rooted."

"It makes me feel like a mermaid, all magic and mystery and seawater."

"I like it."

"I felt like it."

"Wala lang."

Toy Stories

We caught "Toy Story 3" last Friday, and while I enjoyed it, I have to say that I still like the previous two movies better. I think it's the months of hype that pushed my expectations so high. I should sit down and watch it again when it all dies down--that's always how I best enjoyed the previous two movies, anyway: on the living room floor with my brothers, surrounded by their toys.

The movie did get me thinking about my own toys, though; the ones that are still stashed somewhere in my room at home and waiting for me to have kids so they can come out again. This is a list of the ones that stand out in my memory. (I wish I had pictures, but I'm not home right now to take them.)

Faded pink teddy bear. I stubbornly held on to this one, not because I actually had any strong attachment to it--I didn't even play with it that much--but because something in the back of my mind told me, "You have to have something that you've had since nursery school. All the life stories you've heard have someone holding onto something they've had since nursery school."

Sparkly purple teddy bear. Kind of itchy and not even that soft. I remember this because it was one of the first toys my parents got me when we'd first moved to the States. We were still living in the San Joaquin Hotel and our stuff hadn't arrived yet, so my brother and I picked out a few toys from the Salvation Army.

Big box of Lego. My brother Mikko and I shared this toy, also since our San Joaquin days. The space in front of the TV where we watched Nick Jr. (I still know the words to that "Red, red, red ball" song) was littered with these pieces. He liked to build his own stuff while I liked to copy the models on the box's cover. It became kind of a tradition between the two of us to play with these Legos on Christmas mornings while waiting for our parents to wake up. Over the years, though, the bricks were assimilated into the rest of my brothers' Lego collection.

Polly Pocket. I collected a lot of these, getting some of them as gifts and buying the rest with my weekly $1 allowance. My favorites were a small purple horse trailer with a saddled chocolate-colored horse that Polly could ride, the babysitting playset, the school, the mansion, and the ice cream parlor. A recurring storyline involved the floppy brown-haired one turning evil, taking over the town, stealing Polly's boyfriend--the only male figurine in my entire collection--and making everyone wear cement clothes.

Barbie. No girl's toy list is complete without this chick. I had several of the older model, before they adjusted her vital statistics to make her body more realistic. I also had the flat-chested, Skipper who didn't smile. To be honest, I didn't care how small her waistline or how big her boobs were; I just liked giving Barbie things to do in the wooden dollhouse my parents gave me. She had mostly G-rated adventures, until an older playmate took things to soap opera proportions one afternoon by introducing a teen pregnancy storyline for Babysitter Skipper. I feel somewhat traumatized on my dolls' behalf because of this.

Not really a toy: four ballerina figurines. Because they looked alike, they were sisters in my stories. The protagonist was a sitting ballerina (explained by a crippling injury), the least maarte-looking of the four. She was in love with a yellow yarn marionette I'd made. I later made a red one to play the part of lecherous antagonist.

Paradisa Lego sets (the girl-oriented Lego). I'd steal some of my brothers' bricks and male minifigs to stage pirate raids on the Paradisa resort. I had a heroine on a jetski. I was always annoyed with my youngest brother for messing up my playspace, so when I got older, I let him have the Paradisa pieces. I kind of regret this whenever I go home, go to his room, and see them gathering dust on his bookshelf.

Brown stuffed rabbit. My favorite stuffed toy to hug. Mom got him from the thrift store and was supposed to donate him along with a bunch of other toys, but I "borrowed" him from the pile and never gave him back. When I left for college, he and many other toys were hidden in the cupboard above my closet so my mom wouldn't give him away.

a Bratz Jade doll. Jade was the last doll I ever got. I was already in high school, so this cool-looking teen doll with a gang of equally cool friends appealed to me. With her sneakers and casual outfit, I made Jade out to be the athletic girl-next-door and got one of the male Bratz, Dylan, to play her fun boyfriend. But I lost all interest when the Bratz makers put out all those outrageous themed outfits and ditzy movies where Jade was a fashionista, her friends were all screeching caricatures, and Dylan was a useless goofball.