Nest never empty
This essay is included in “In Certain Seasons,” an anthology of writings by mothers during the pandemic, published by the Cultural Center of the Philippines. The e-book was launched January 2021.
I am 44 and I have four children. Actually, adults. This year, the year clouded by the COVID-19 pandemic and many other woes, B is 26, J is 24, S is 20, and E is 18.
Because of the relatively small age difference – I was my youngest kid’s age when I gave birth to my eldest – my kids and I generally get along. Our shared experience of fleeing a less-than-ideal household in 2007, and our many years of struggling financially just to keep things together, made the journey more difficult. It also made us more cohesive.
This year, more than a decade after establishing our own life, we have done much to turn our situation around. When we started our lives again, we just had one folding bed and a few monobloc chairs in the living room, and the five of us shared a tiny bedroom in an apartment in Valenzuela, where the floods cut you off from the rest of the world. I had one regular job.
Now we rent a modest condominium unit in the heart of Quezon City, where the lighting is good and the windows are large. I have earned a master’s degree and have some consultancies while keeping that job, in which I had gained tenure and some measure of credibility.
When the enhanced community quarantine started in March, only the younger children were living with me. B, on a work-from-home arrangement with an international NGO, was living with her partner in a building just 10 minutes – a tricycle ride – away. J, juggling music teaching and live performances as a jazz bass player, was with his partner and a couple of other friends, farther out. The two “small kids,” S and E, were still in school, looking forward to pursuing careers in their respective fields of interest.
At that point, I was feeling a host of emotions. Relief because it looked like I had not done bad as a single parent, happiness that the older ones felt bold enough to move out and carve a life for themselves, pride that the four seemed like they were decent human beings, and hope that they would establish paths at the intersection of their interest and competence.
Introvert that I am, I was also grateful for quieter days. I could spend an entire morning in the living room without having to talk to anybody!
At the same time, I felt just a bit nostalgic that time seemed to fly. I worried that while they may be all right now, wounds from their early years would find a way of seeping through an otherwise well-ordered life. There was also a voice that nagged: Once they all left the coop, and I was not meant to marry again, did that mean I would grow old alone?
When the virus came, these thoughts took a backseat to the very real danger of getting sick.
Technology helped. All of us monitored the rising numbers and took extra precautions for our own safety. We already had a Facebook group chat, the five of us, but then it was mostly used to bark out instructions (me) and to share inane videos and memes (them). Now we used it for video calls with B and J, updating each other on what we were up to.
The small kids learned to watch Koreanovelas together, a spinoff from the “movie nights” I tried to introduce early on. We learned to keep meals simple most days, but set a day or two in a week when we could order out. I found a former caterer who now delivered home-cooked meals in a box, from whom I ordered meals for three households. As it was for many, Grab proved an indispensable ally.
After two months, the enhanced community quarantine gave way to the modified enhanced community quarantine, and things just got a bit more relaxed. J, who had lost all live-performance gigs, first came for an extended visit, and then decided to move back in until he could regain his footing. He also shifted to giving his lessons online. B started dropping by regularly for Sunday lunch, often bringing dessert. Sundays became a good excuse to make a meal special.
Certainly none of us expected that the virus would stay longer than it has.
It is now November, and I am still working from home, and the smaller ones are engrossed in their online classes. All university entrance examinations have been canceled this year, so E is working hard on his grades to make his applications more attractive. Even the national strings competition he has joined, and for which he had been chosen among the grand finalists, will be held online. He has asked me to get him a new long-sleeved shirt or barong for the finals; I am imagining how either would register on the screen.
Meanwhile, S, now on the dean’s list, is realizing how right she was to pursue a psychology major. She juggles her time on video calls with friends, staying up for her own “movie nights” with a boy she mostly sees online, keeping her grades up, and making Tiktok videos many people seem to find hilarious.
J, who has moved back, is a valuable companion around the house, regaling us with his dishes, organizing chores, and ensuring his younger sister and brother do their share on their specific turns. He also brought several plants from his apartment, and the greens have made our space look healthier and more breathable.
We have worked on some “group” recipes, which we briefly considered selling online. We made spicy marinara sauce from fresh tomatoes but figured we needed really attractive bottles to put them in. We made arroz caldo and crispy tofu but thought they would have gone cold and soggy by the time they reached any potential customer. Pink Pinoy sopas would be nice but the macaroni would have absorbed the soup by the time it got to the buyer. Tortang talong took too long to make and too short a time to devour. No, we decided: e dishes would just be for our own consumption, so we gave them names. Mommy Rice, Gising-gising ni J, S Lugaw, and – well, E declared he was perfectly happy washing dishes.
We also discovered, quite by accident, a Leslie Sansone video of fitness walking, and there was a time we moved the furniture to the side every day after dinner. Sadly, after a few months, we have failed to follow through. I only walk mostly when I feel like it, and in my room.
Just this week, B learned that another unit in my building has been advertised for rent, and has jumped at the opportunity to see if she could move back to be under the same (big) roof as the rest of us are. Imagine being just three floors below! She says she can just wander off into my home when on break from work, and we can walk her dog – a fluffy, slightly-obese Maltese named Cloud – around the university oval in the late afternoons.
Meanwhile, I am up to my neck with my regular gigs while also preparing my courses – I start teaching at a new university -- full time -- in two months. It is likely the course will still be delivered online. I have spruced up my home office inside my room and established another one outside that could serve as a co-working space for everybody: Two desk-and-chair sets, a long couch, and a view facing east from a wide window – think of glorious sunset views. Every. Single. Afternoon.
I did develop a vice: I have invested insanely in various chairs – a big, bright-green accent chair, an ergonomic executive swivel chair with the all-important lumbar support, a Scandinavian ghost chair, a white leather one that is sadly prettier to look at than comfortable to sit on, a rocking chair that is so fragile only I am allowed to sit on it, and a sleek but cushy -- if there is such a thing -- gray one of which even the wooden legs are pretty.
These days, it is easy to feel like one is in suspension, or on a pause, knowing that life will ow back to “normal” – crazy, chaotic, fast-paced, and noisy – once the virus is contained.
For my pause, I never think of the nest as half-empty, or that it might become completely empty, anymore. Even when it is good and safe for the children to go back out into the world, the nest will always be here, and they know they have roots to return to when they feel either need or nostalgia. I think of it as refueling, before they fly out, yet again.
