About Ampy (conclusion)

After graduating from UP and landing my first job, I began taking Ampy to dine out on special occasions, only to realize that I knew very little about her history. She was three times my age and had been alive long before my parents sent me to live in Malate. I did know a few basic things, though. That she had been married to a certain Brigidier, who had children by his first wife. In fact, I often answered the phone whenever Ludy, one of her step-daughters, gave a her call in Malate. That soon after their marriage Brigidier died and Ampy would never marry again. However, I knew nothing about the kind of life that she'd led with this family. How was she as a wife? As a mother? The only thing that reminded me that she had her own family was the letters delivered by the postman. They were addressed to Ampy "de Leon." My two other spinster aunts carried "Singson" as their surname.

So as much as possible, I converted our occacional lunch dates into interviews. I was interested in knowing the 70+ long years behind my aunt. She held the key not only to her history but to the history of my mom's family. The names of far-away relatives, stories about the old ancestral house in Cavite and in Kalye Remedios, of life during the war, were things I hadn't paid enough attention to as a young resident in our ancestral house for six years. Now that I was much older, I wanted Ampy to retell me these stories. Unfortunately and quite to my shame, I have made very little progress in this small project of mine.

To this day Ampy still writes letters to me while I prefer to call her occasionally given that writing snail mail is one of my greatest shortcomings. It's as if to prove with pride that the fuzzy vision of one of her eyes is still enough for her to write. I don't know how she does it but her penmanship seems exactly the same as that when her eyes were still functional. Also, on the phone, she doesn't sound like an 80-year-old woman. She's still as sharp as ever that sometimes I feel embarrassed when she catches me paying little attention.

She never fails to send something over to me thru my mom -- usually some vitamins, ointment for a body pain I'd complained to her about, or some gift which she fishes out from her cabinet of old stuff. She used to give me money when I was younger. Now, she doesn't earn any more money but still looks for something to give me from whatever belongings she has left in her old age.

One time, according to my mom, Ampy said I was like her own child. She does have step-children but since the death of her husband, the connection has diminished if not completely disappeared. She never bore her own child. On my part, I have this fear that she will pass away while I'm out of the Philippines, that one day I will get an emergency call from my mom that Ampy is gone. This fear is so great that sometimes I get paranoid and call home suddenly just to check on her. It is one fear that I hope will never materialize because I love her so much.