Off to Turbina Indefinitely

Julia is one-year-and-eight-months old who is a little actress of the house. She shifts so easily from a crying baby to a mood she sets after getting what she wants. She doesn’t annoy us with this but is a surprise to all of us. Julia has bucket of tears and would roll down the floor not knowing what she desires that very minute. I never knew that Julia wanted what I was holding. It’s actually my new toothbrush! We bought her one that suits her age but she is not using it. Now, she delights to grab mine! I digress. I go off her point. What would pacify her? Her mother’s breast - Julie’s nipples for nibbling. Mommy calls her name and shows what she has for our little baby.

But, right now, she is being sent off to Laguna. Julia won’t have a taste of her mother’s milk for one week. This is part of the family’s plan of not breastfeeding the baby anymore. I overheard sometime ago my father-in-law and his concern over breastfeeding Julia. He said that this must be stopped immediately. He said, “Kailangang lutasin na ‘yan” for reasons such as that a new baby is coming; that she begins working soon, etcetera. Soon, I’ll see my baby no more when I get back home tonight.

I text her that Turbina is too far and that Judy can help. My brother’s wife is willing and has two grown-up kids who are fun of our baby and that Julia can play with them while Julie reports to Sta. Isabel College . That, instead of Lola Leonida, Julia stays with Lola Lita whose abode is only three streets away from ours. I also said that this will allow us to spend nights with Julia and avoid missing her. She complains about severe coughing in my mother’s house and that she can’t take the pain of breastfeeding Julia anymore. Julia wounds her nipples.

At lunchtime, I thought about her - a babe-in-arms. Her soft body requires only touches of her mother who now begs for a break. Mine, sometimes, do her harm. Julia’s speech always reverberates wherever I am. From nowhere at Merk’s Bistro, she sounded and called, “papa!” Her eyes speak her exhaustion from what we do. She frequents Tutuban (and the like), Cavite , Laguna and visited Bicol. Julia bathed in the Malinao River in Bicol in a borrowed red swimsuit, her first time.

I want her in gowns in whatever time of the day for she’s lovelier. She moves, though, does not speak like Cruzita. Julia dances MariMar and just like any kid, also preempts or joins the singer with Aw! She stirs Itaktak Mo , Iyugyog Mo , etcetera. She points to the direction where the television is and knows when (what specific time of the day) to request for TV programs – morning cartoons, Takeshi Castle, Wowowee!, Daisy Siete for Philippine’s Sexbomb dancers, Zaido, and MariMar before ending her day at her mother’s breastplate.

Julie and I would tell her that Julia is pang-Jollibee lamang because Julia ruins our pizza dates at all times. She eats a little and plays afterwards. She moves around, run, go up the stairs, to and fro. But Julia completes my date with my wife.

I hope my wife Julie will have a change of mind and that as soon as I reach for our doorstep later, Julia awaits and murmurs, “Ano ka ba, papa?