The fifth father

“A father prays to take on the pain the world inflicts on his children, and when that fails, prays his children are stronger than he would have been. And each time a father feels rejected or resented or neglected, as his children fly off to pursue their dreams, he sheds a silent, three-sided tear. A tear that reminds him that he did that to his father, and one that scares him into thinking his children no longer want to know him, and the fear that it may one day be too late. He wants to be part of it, to feel needed. That is one thing they will never know. Until they have children, too.”

- “The Game of My Life”,

The Philippine Star, June 2017

Father’s Day.

Historically an afterthought, a far second to the more commercially viable Mother’s Day, one of three days of the year (aside from Valentine’s Day and All Souls Day) when flowers in the Philippines cost as much as gold. For Dad? Maybe a necktie. Or a day to put his feet up. There’s nothing that symbolizes effort and discipline. And often, Dad is the bad cop. Except on the rare occasion when he’s the cool Dad. It is, however, as good a time as any for introspection.

I’ve written about the four men I considered father. First, my biological father, John William Schöen, youngest son of a German dentist and an Irish mother. After I was born in Chicago, my saintly mother Lirio brought me home to the Philippines. I only met John when I was 23, after almost two years of tracking him down. After 1989, he disappeared again. In 2012, a few months after Mom died, I found him again, and phoned long distance. He hung up on me. From him, I learned that all relationships have a role, and a time limit, in your life. It all expires. Sport is a constant reminder. Wasn’t it just yesterday that I watched Jaworski, Jordan, Tyson, got married? No, it was three decades ago. So much has changed from that tangent.

Then there was my grandfather, Jose Aldeguer Unson. Our rock, our generous Daddy Peping. Around him, we wanted for nothing. He ran the government agencies in charge of trading sugar, and Broadcast City, where RPN 9 and IBC-13 were once king. He gave me my first exposure to broadcasting. And whichever sport I fancied growing up, he supported. When I started swimming, lessons and pool fees were no problem. When I became a goalkeeper, he got me Joe Namath spikes on his trips abroad. Whenever I needed a new basketball, I didn’t have to ask twice. He taught me that giving can be effortless, the world can be prosperous and limitless, and old music eases your pain.

When I was seven, Mom married my stepfather, Luis Velasco Jr. Ours was a tempestuous relationship. He was firmly mired in the concrete of the old school. I was free-floating through different fields of creativity: drama, writing, drawing, music. He believed in what could be seen, touched, tweaked with tools. He read the newspaper from cover to cover. I believed in dreams. The only thing we had in common was sports, particularly boxing, the NBA and the PBA in its prime. That, we could discuss without tangoing on eggshells. His lessons, though painful for a long time, are no less enlightening. Life has a practical side. You have to be prepared for it. Dreams need to be rooted in reality. This, I ignored in my long, lonely basketball practices in our driveway, and in every sport I took up.

In first year high school,I met Onofre Pagsanghan. He has always been the homeroom teacher of the first-year high school honors class at the Ateneo. He was 53. I was 13, a freshly-minted brat out of La Salle Greenhills. Of equal significance, he was also moderator of Dulaang Sibol, the theater group where I found asylum during those rollercoaster years. Football didn’t work out, and I wasn’t ready for varsity basketball yet. It seemed that everything I excelled at, someone else was doing better. I found solace in that safe, spiritual oasis, where we were all brothers, where the problems of teens like us were treated with care. He understood – and respected – us. Around Mr. Pagsi, you were compelled to be your best. Always. He lives with a fire that the world entire could never dim, always has. That’s a lesson I try to live up to even now, 42 years later. Even from a distance, we love him and consider him proof that God exists, like every sunrise.

When you become a father, a lot of thoughts fill your mind, just as dread fills your heart. It feels like a race where the finish line keeps moving away, and you’ve already started behind. It gets both easier and harder as time goes by. Your children grow, and you can explain the world to them. But then again, you could be wrong, or they could choose not to listen to you. And sometimes, they remember their struggles, not that you helped them through it all. Often, they remember the frustration, or anger, instead of the love and support. And that’s something fathers live with. It’s part of the deal.

Athletes in individual sports like swimming, boxing, martial arts and long-distance running for example, know this feeling all too well. When there are no crowds cheering, no coaches alongside you, when everything hurts, the only voice you can count on is your own. But there’s one major difference. You can stop swimming. You can stop punching. You can stop running. I can’t turn off being Dad.

Then I found my fifth father. I looked in the mirror.

Men in general (and fathers in particular), often forget that they have the power to nurture themselves. So in the maddening cacophony of fearful thoughts which get louder and louder when your children leave home, you have to push through. You have to make yourself better, stronger, alone if you must.

Then comes the hardest part.

You wait. You wait for the time when they come to you; when they realize that they need you. And it may never come. You feel like a fire extinguisher in a well-built house, slowly expiring every day. That’s part of the deal, too.

At the end of the day, I only have myself. And that – whether I believe it or not – is enough.