The very idea that you are no longer on this earth is almost more than I can bear. I still so vividly remember the last conversation we had. We were lounging in Chris’ room just a few days ago. You said, "Hey, Manoy Poopy, guess what? I’ve come up with the perfect diet!"
With a sneer growing on my face, I asked you what the ingredients of the KC Diet Prescription were and wondered whether you had found a better solution to the South Beach Diet.
"Manoy Poopy, here’s how it works. First, you eat everything you want: All the junk food – from Cheetos to cheese bread, Combos, Tapa King with garlic rice, McDonald’s french fries, sour cream Piattos, Starbucks’ Hot White Chocolate Mocha, Auntie Anne’s pretzels and Maltesers," you related with such pride.
So I asked you, "Um, Memekay…So, what exactly is this diet?
"Simple," you said emphatically. You just throw up everything after eating it!"
This revelation, of course, brought out the big brother in me. After explaining that bulimia wasn’t exactly the best alternative to the South Beach Diet – mainly because it would eventually result in boring a hole inside one’s digestive track – you pondered for a moment, and then uttered such an unforgettable statement.
"Oh really? I didn’t know that!"
And while such a statement rings of the unadulterated naiveté common to 16-year-old girls, I’m almost certain that right after uttering those words, you popped another cheese ball in your mouth.
• I wish I could have been one of your 18 roses at your debut.
• I wish I had the chance to do a critical and in-depth psychological/physical analysis of your suitors, and determine that NONE of them were worthy of you.
• I wish we could still run to your room, come up with conspiracy theories about the conspicuous characters who constantly waltzed in and out of our front door.
• I wish we could still gossip in the family hall about the latest tempestuous love affair between some maid, driver, or guard in the house.
• I wish I could have taken you on your first debaucherous trip to Boracay, gotten you smashed on margaritas and had Mom and Ate Carissa yell at me for making you do it.
• I wish I could still have the chance to try your favorite salt-laden midnight snack of steak, rice, and Knorr.
• I wish I could have had the chance to personally take you to see some big showbiz event so you could nonchalantly get your photo taken with Piolo Pascual or Mark Herras.
• I wish we could still jump up and down on Christopher’s bed, like a couple of crazed people, dancing and singing to your latest favorite song from MTV.
• I wish I could have convinced you that there were far better diets than bulimia or outright starvation, which could have launched what would have been an amazing modeling career in this country.
Most of all, my dear Memekay, I just wish I could have been there for you for anything you ever needed me to do. I wish I could still accompany you to escape to Europe, get lost in the subways of New York, or rush to the ABS-CBN studios to secretly catch The Buzz or ASAP live. And maybe . . . even watch you tape your cameo as an extra in an episode of GMA7’s Love to Love.
We were all so proud of you. Because you were the most stylish, spunky, and endearing firecracker of a woman we had ever come across. Remember that time, many years ago, when Tito Joe and Mom threw a sit-down dinner in the house for Cardinal Sin? After eating, Mom and Tito Joe introduced you to the Cardinal. I remember him stretching his venerable hand, expecting you, my docile sister, to kiss his eminence’s ring.
But apparently, that was the last thing on your mind. Who knew what kind of fashion sense and downright frame-of-mind you had at that young age?!? Next thing everyone knew, you had grabbed the red miter off his head, and ran hell-bent to your room, just as if you had finally discovered the coolest hat of the summer season.
Tito Joe and Mom were mortified. Personally, I think God had a pretty darn good laugh that night.
You also remember that other time when several years back, when Mom and Tito Joe invited Imelda Marcos and her Blue Ladies for cocktails in the house? I remember Mom making such a big deal about the hors d’oeuvres to be served. I remember you barging into the foyer, taking one look at all of these heavily made up women downing caviar canapé after caviar canapé and saying in a rather loud voice, "Mom parang ang takaw takaw naman ng mga bisita mo? Baka wala nang matirang pagkain para sa amin ni Kuya!," (Mom, your guests sure eat a lot! There might not be enough food left for me and my brother!).
Sure enough, there were plenty of leftovers from that cocktail party that night. Those are just two of so many examples why you left – and have left – such an indelible mark on our lives, how your psyche and outright kookiness will burn in our hearts for as long as we live. You were always unapologetic, outspoken, democratic and that kind of free soul that is so rare in this country. You reached out in your own way to everyone. The entire plantilla of maids, drivers, bodyguards, security guards, electricians, nurses and mechanics had somehow become your extended barkada and family. More than anyone in the house, aside from Christopher, you, together with your yayas, could recite from memory and recant the exact storylines of every recent Philippine telenovela made, from Sana’y Wala Nang Wakas to Marina.
So here’s the crux of the tragedy that haunts me now, and I know, what makes all of us think. You could have so easily chosen to live the life of a Maria Clara. How much easier it would have been to just fit into the mold: Dress and act like a cookie-cutter Catholic school girl, simply shut up and smile at the powerful movers and shakers who would be seated next to you, and play the perfect political daughter – the goodie-two-shoes kind of girl. But it would have never been you. From day one, until the day you left our world, you were never just another "yes-woman" to anyone. Just ask Mom or Dad or any national or international figure that met you for that matter.
You had the beauty and brawn of our dear mother, packed with the brains of Tito Joe. Who knows what kind of impact you would have made once you had gone off to college in UC Berkley, become the woman you chose to be, made the career choices you would have made, and finally created that independent life you had always dreamed of building…You could have easily put GMA to shame. Heck, with your dual Fil-Am passport, you could have easily been the next Asian Hillary Clinton.
When I ask myself these questions now, the tears just flow and flow. Somehow, I know my days will get easier. I know that as we speak, you are revamping heaven in your own way, bombarding God himself with your plethora of knick-knacks, crash diet remedies, and jaw-dropping, dead-pan one-liners, just as you did with the rest of us.
And that makes me smile.
But you know, although your Manoy Poopy still has a lot of family members here who are trying their best to console me, Memekay, my dearest kechipot, the searing pain in my heart is the realization that I just can no longer have you beside me.
I will always recall how I would always tease you by saying, "KC, how’s my favorite baby sister?" And you would rebut in your own irascible way, "Duh, Manoy Ipe, I’m your ONLY baby sister!"
You’re so right, kechipot.
You’ll always be my one and only baby sister. How I hope and pray, wherever you are, that you know that I’ll miss you forever.
Love,
Manoy Poopy