Standing on the shoulders of giants

MANILA, Philippines - Earlier this month, in preparation for the STAR’s anniversary issue, I was reading about the late Max Soliven, former publisher of The Philippine STAR. It dawned on me that, though I’ve seen him many times along the STAR corridors, I’ve never actually met him. I could’ve come up to him to say “Good morning” in any one of these occasions, but not once did. I ran into him one day, during my first year as a writer and all I managed to do was hurriedly shuffle past him. We tend to think that things would be around longer, and opportunities are lost.

About two months ago, I sat down with our executive editor, Amy Pamintuan. She always looks so tough, and maybe she is, but during the interview, she spoke with a childlike passion that filled that small room in the corner of our rather grim editorial section with a hope that I thought was absent among veteran journalists like herself. She spoke of changing the country, making it better. It was a revelation, perhaps more of my own misplaced optimism than her disarmingly cheery disposition.

A few days back, I was writing an article about the queen of Lifestyle, Millet Mananquil. All I know of her, I’ve heard through her staff. I know she is like a second mother to them — can you imagine working with your mom? One who checks your grammar and rightly punctuates sentences you’ve managed to wrong? The thought sends shivers up my spine. I’ve never had anyone of her caliber check my work. But everyone in her staff loves their job and her, maybe more than any writer in The STAR loves her job and her editor.

The Philippine STAR is home to many world-class journalists. We see them almost every day, but seldom get the chance to talk to them. Even in our own mangled paradise city (where the boys are green and the girls are witty), we see these journalists as the icons that they are — hardly as people who, perhaps, would like to be greeted with a smile, or added on Facebook. We shuffle past them, thinking they would pay no mind to pedestrians like us. Maybe they wouldn’t even notice our attempts at avoiding eye contact. Their lives would be no less awesome without us.

Did I mention I broke into tears while reading about Manong Max? Sobbing alone in our well-lit office, it occurred to me that I may not have the right to call him ‘Manong Max’, simply because, to me, he was Sir Max Soliven, the Publisher, the Journalist. He may have as well been Gandalf, and I, a lowly muggle. Not even in the same movie. Upon reading his last article dated November 25, 2006, talking about the catacombs of Tokyo and his beginnings as a cheeky newspaperman in the city, I imagined what it would be like to have coffee with him. I would definitely write a book about our conversation: Orange Mocha Frappuccino with Max. In an AVP for the STAR’s anniversary, Ma’am Millet mentioned that talking to Max Soliven was like reading the pages of a history book. Our generation could only hope to have known him that way.

Sometimes I find myself wishing I had been born a decade sooner. Then I would’ve been a writer by the late 80s, mentored by respected writers of that era — our editors today. And I wouldn’t be too young to hang out with them either, if they’d have me. If I am allowed to carry the lessons I’ve learned — you know, into my radical reincarnation as a writer from the late 80s — I would greet Manong Max every time I see him, and maybe dare to ask him for writing advice. It matters that we had never met him. It matters to many writers that they are not under the iron grip of such editors, whose passion and genius can sear our skin thick and prepare us for anything.

I would have loved to have already been a journalist when The STAR was just a baby. Although Ma’am Amy was hardly at the office during the paper’s formative years (having been assigned to cover Malacañang), her stories about The STAR and the people behind it give me a strange nostalgia for something I’ve never known. Betty Go-Belmonte, one of our founders and mother of our president and CEO, Miguel G. Belmonte, seemed like a kind, generous woman with a wealth of wisdom to share. Anyone who has met her has only kind words to say about how she led The STAR to success.

And here I go again with my misplaced optimism. It’s not uncommon for us to want to be part of something great. The STAR’s 25^th year preparations made me wonder: what if I had been there from the start, what would I have contributed to the paper? Maybe it’s a sentiment writers of my generation share. Why are we here? We are not worthy. Am I writing enough? It’s never enough. I am reading enough? I don’t know enough. Does it matter?

It’s all too easy to feel small when you’re in the company of greatness. But as I read that last article by our late publisher, it occurred to me that I am here, and though some of the people who have made this living, breathing giant that is The Philippine STAR are not, our editors, leaders, and this generation’s stars are. It’s not so bad being an 80s child, writing in the year 2011 for the number one paper in the country. We are all indebted to their greatness, their wisdom. Being published with the same ink and on the same paper as the people we looked up to growing up is just as good as hanging out with them — but for the whole country to see.