Meet my parents instead

Meet my parents instead

For the past few days I received many email messages congratulating me for putting up a personal blog (visit http://reginaldtamayo.blogspot.com). My blog followers are mixed ranging from former classmates, friends, relatives, regional directors, national journalists, priests, a former beauty queen to unknown but well-meaning blog site readers. Of late, most of them especially those who revealed themselves only online asked me to introduce myself too. In fact my online readers keep on expanding everyday and the pressure to open my self to them is overwhelming. As is true elsewhere in the world of blogs, bloggers are fixated with anonymity, locked their profiles and used pseudo-names. However, I lay down my arms and opt to introduce myself but in a different manner- by introducing my parents to you. Shakespeare said “The tree may be known by the fruit, as the fruit by the tree” (Henry IV, Part 1," Act 4, Scene 2). This echoes the biblical words “For each tree is known by its own fruit…” (St. Luke 6:44). I will exactly do the opposite- I will introduce myself by letting you know the “tree” for you to know the “fruit.”

I am one of the two sons of poor but pious parents- the late Rogelio Espiritu Tamayo, Sr. and Teresita Cuntapay Balisi. My father did not finish college because of poverty. My mother only finished a vocational course again because of poverty. I say ours is a generational poverty because my grandparents were poor too. However, to be in a poor home with pious parents was a blessing.

My father worked as a typist. He accepted typing jobs from a logging company. He was out of work when logging was banned. My mother was a gasoline girl. On one occasion, when I was in 2nd year high school my mother asked me to teach her how to write numbers from 1 to 10,000, how to use a calculator, how to fill up an official receipt, and how to add numbers with decimal points. I told my father about it. My father and I painstakingly taught her these things for many nights. I saw joy in the eyes of my mother when she learned them well.

I vividly recall when my parents and I have to watch over the house of the boss of my mother. There were times when mother’s boss and his family have to leave for Manila. My mother always admonished me not to touch anything inside the mansion while she and my father have to mop the floor, clean the window panes, change curtains, and the like. I usually helped them clean the mansion while giving an envious look at the expensive and dazzling toys of the sons of my mother’s boss.

I remember my parents to have pawned their wedding rings because of our needs. Our unmet needs were blessings too. These needs motivate us to pray. We were Sunday mass-goers. Papa visited the church on weekdays to pray while mama attends mass daily. Nowadays, if mama is not at home, she would be with her prayer group to lead a pawalu (prayer for the dead) at any wake, she would be in the church arranging flowers before religious relics or dusting them off.

I also reminisce when one day my father took me to Tuguegarao to visit his parents. I was comfortably seated beside him inside the bus. Unceremoniously, he asked me to vacate our seats for new passengers on board. From Lallo to Tuguegarao my father and I remained standing. When we got off the bus I heard the conductor saying “Pasensya pare ha. Marami kasing pasahero.” Hearing such, I understood that my father did not have much money for our fare and had asked for a free ride for both of us.

When I was in college at UP Diliman, my parents usually send my monthly P600 allowance thru a bus from the province. I have to go to the bus terminal in Sampaloc, Manila every last Saturday of the month to get it. At times, when my parents were unable to send my monthly stipend, I received a glass coffee-container with dried fish or adobo. I have to consume this for a week until I get back to the bus terminal to push my luck. It was good I have my late uncle UP History Professor Wilfredo E. Tamayo to lean on during those trying times when I was completing my AB Philosophy.

When I was asked to prove my teaching skills in a teaching demonstration at the Lyceum of Aparri, I did not have a short polo-barong and a leather shoes. My mother borrowed a loose barong tagalog from a neighbor and I was forced to use the shoes of my father. I looked like a clown when I gave lecture before the Academic Deans and priest-administrators. When I got the teaching job, as a gesture of patting on my back, my father gave me a belt as a gift. I still used this dull and old belt whenever I miss my father.

When DILG requested me to lecture about legislation and parliamentary procedures, my father, who was then a barangay captain, was one of the audience. I asked him to come forward and I introduced him to the provincial director and other dignitaries. He was beaming with pride that he asked the photographer to take picture of us before my lecture.

When I was appointed Dean of Liberal Arts and Dean of Student Afairs, I toured my parents once in our school, the Lyceum of Aparri, and in our office at the municipal hall and introduced them to people from both the school and government but personally that is nothing compared to their manner of touring me into the ways of humility and the love for lady poverty and the way they introduced me to God. From them, I learned how to pray the rosary and novena everyday. From them, I learned the value hard work and honesty. From them, I learned to bend my knees in prayer.

My parents may not have the aristocracy of the schooled and the learned but they were my first teachers who taught me valuable lessons in life. They will forever be etched in my heart.

Now, you know me.