a passionate woman who is also not a mother

i have always heard this from my mother, and now i hear it from my friends who are mothers. lucky (or unlucky for me), i am not a mother.

“mothers can put their own lives and interests on hold as a sacrifice to their children”


Itonan Day Care Center, Buluang, Baao, Cam Sur

as noble as this seems, it is a sort of negligence: withholding who she is - the best part of herself - from her children.

we were having our weekly “meeting”, and our occasional treasure hunting in Iriga City. and it surfaced again (i actually used to get so uncomfortable when the topic smoothly shifts to being a mother, i not being one). and it seems particularly poignant this week with oodles of mothering talk in the air, this week being the time that i am awaiting the result of the recent competition i was nominated to (National Search for the Most Outstanding Rural Women 2008). and what came into my mind was how i answered the question posed at me by Ma’am Flor, the team leader of the panel of validators from the Dept. of Agriculture.

when the team of validators came over and interviewed me, one of the questions (which i was actually expecting to be asked) was: being unmarried and without child, how will you inspire women who are happily married and are fulfilled mothers? spontaneously, i blurted out the value of gratitude. “every woman dreams of becoming a bride, a wife, a mother, but if neither one nor all doesn’t happen, one can still be an outstanding woman, and live a meaningful life. to the happily married women and fulfilled mothers, i can evoke gratitude in them. gifts come in all different shapes and sizes, and having a family is one great gift any woman should be grateful for. being alone and single and childless is also a gift (i have learned to appreciate it sooner than later). it is in how we look at the situations we are thrown into, we can choose to see the sun or the clouds.”

talk fell to "how do you do it all?", a perennial favourite, and the answer is that i don't. i do far more than i thought i ever could and occasionally startle myself when i see myself through the eyes of the old me. i give to others in huge swaths of time and energy, thought and feeling. the secret is that i put myself on that list. my passions, which could easily be denigrated as mere hobbies, are the reason i wake with a joy in the morning, eager to see what the day brings and what i can do within its bounds.


dilapidated Aeta tribal hall - they seem to be invisible, nobody notices them, till now

i have learned not to be afraid to think of myself as a woman who also happens NOT to be a mother. when i do this, the vibrancy and passion that i bring to life makes me a better person. the self that does the self-sacrificing is that much stronger, that much more energized, that much more interesting. i will never be a mama. but i can be Bernadette, Bidibidi, B. and then i let that woman be a mother not to one child, but to many, to the children of the world. and i have a far more fascinating self to give.



the Aeta kids of Caranday, Baao, Cam Sur