Carmen Guerrero Nakpil: Mother's Day is for sissies

MANILA, Philippines - I know one mom who won’t be happy this Mother’s Day: Mine.

Just at about this time, I can almost hear the blood-curdling scream from her condo as she unfurls this newspaper — and reads this feature. (Mom loves the smell of printer’s ink in the morning and there is still a regular stampede for old media as soon as the sun rises.)

Mother’s Day, as far as our family is concerned, is for sissies. (And don’t even think about breaking into song on Mom’s birthday “Hmmph!” she’ll snap. “‘Happy Birthday’ was written for a spinster from Alabama.”)

No spinsters here — oh, I forgot, except for me. (The family marriage-average being 1.5 per capita, and I have woefully let the side down.)

For my job as rock-band manager (a title that makes Mom roll her eyes up), I have found my way to almost every city and town across the archipelago. One thing is a constant: I am always asked the dreaded question, almost as soon as I get out of the airplane door: “Are you the daughter of the writer?” It’s always said with the subtext of “Could you be — nah, it couldn’t be, but perhaps due to some accident of the universe, you could?”

The thought has occurred, in fact.

Mom loves to tell the story that when I was born, there was a thunderclap and all the lights went out. The doctors were in such a tizzy they forgot to record the full details of my birth, except for my name and the date. I have daydreamed since I was little that perhaps babies had been switched in the blackout and out there is the real Lizza Nakpil. These days, I imagine her as fast-talking, gorgeously dressed, and churning out Hollywood screenplays and best-selling novels on magicians. Thus would the mantle be rightly worn by someone whose mother was a published author at age five.

We could not be more dissimilar. I love hearts and flowers and the whole shebang. Mom takes one look at my house and says, “Do you think you’re living in a stage set?” I’m the original couch potato and Mom is a ball of fire. Even in her 80s, she’s embroidering with one hand, writing essays in two languages, watching TV and chatting on the phone — all, it seems to me, at the same time. If she knew how to tweet, the whole city would probably be riveted. “When are you going to learn how to multi-task?” she asked me the other day. You get the picture.

To complete the cruel twist of fate, people say that I look most like Mom. It befuddles people. Just last week, an eminent bishop came up to me, mistaking me for the real thing, and engaged me in heavy-duty political conversation. “It’s not a good thing to be mistaken for an 88-year-old,” Mom laughed when I told her the story. I don’t mind at all, as long as the 88-year-old is her.