Quite a ride

Due to circumstance (all her pamangkins of recent years are boys) and the fact that she's excited to dress up the child in all sorts of ribbons and laces, Leah is dead-set on praying for a little baby girl. She addresses the baby as a girl, talks about it as if she were sure, and has even successfully campaigned for the name if it turns out to be a girl (we haven't picked a name yet if it turns out to be a boy).

Except for some faint, archaic notion that the eldest should be a son, I have no preference on the matter. I know the little bugger will grab my heart at the earliest opportunity and run away laughing with it while I look on -- bewildered that such a small creature with the smallest hands can sway my heart this way and that.

If it turns out to be a girl, I imagine sweet kisses and bedtime tickles. We will sing with her teddies and pick out names for her pets. I imagine my walls, notebooks, tables, and every other surface with her squiggly, girly penmanship, and nighttime jaunts to look at the stars. I can see her spilling her milk on the table, because she would insist she can do it, and answering endless questions of which i like better (puppies or kittens? blue or green? her lola's cooking or her mommy's) just so she'll know which she should like more. We'll have our special time on Saturday mornings because her mom refuses to wake early, so we'll go out and buy pandesal and eat them on the street, waiting for more hawkers who offer their wares. I hope she tells me everything, most especially the annoying little boys in her school because her tatay is her best friend in the whole wide world.

if it's a boy, then I'm on more familiar ground. It's all about adventure, and what's the next new thing he can do. We'll find spiders for fighting and dig for little crabs on the beach. Scraped knees due to bike accidents and torn t-shirts from climbing trees. We'll build paper boats and fly kites, watch community basketball tournaments and eat isaw on the streets. I will show him when to be patient (while waiting for the fish to bite the lure) and when to be decisive (whenever someone needs help). And I will tell him to never ever bet money against his lolo on card games because his lolo always cheats.

Whether boy or a girl, I would watch old Bruce Lee movies with them and practice screaming "ha-ya!" while we do karate outside the house. I would read them stories and ask them to tell their own versions to their friends. We will eat aratiles, never watch news, and read lots and lots of comic books. I will make sure they are always courteous to waiters, to the elderly, and to never be afraid of questioning their teachers. I will try to teach them that there are truths that are only true sometimes, and that some truths remain even if no one else believes them.

When they are a bit older, perhaps I can tell them my own stories. And when they are old enough to have children of their own, stories no one has ever heard. We will name stars, make up our own songs, disbelieve what we read. My children will know me -- not just as their father, but as me.

And if the heavens favor me, they will learn with me that God is far more terrible, and far gentler than what they may have heard.