Momsy

I believe I've always been a mama's girl. My earliest memory of it was when I jumped out of the tricycle that popsy was driving because momsy had to go out to make tulak nung tumirik. Haha! That was the incident where I got the lumang 2-peso size peklat on my left knee. Another was when I got bitten by a dog who just gave birth because I woke up in the middle of the night looking for her and she happened to be at a prayer meeting at this neighbor's house. All of us would say that we have the best moms (and dads) in the world. Syempre naman, wala tayong choice e. :) So for a change, instead of citing my reasons why she's the best, I'll share something different for this post.

We used to call her "mama." In the kasagsagan of our kabadingan, suddenly she became "momsy" and papa became "popsy." To the format of Bianca Gonzalez's column in the Philstar, here are ten things you probably didn't know about momsy.
1. Her name is Leovita Ortiz Alcantara. Their names were taken from calendars before. Creative no? I always tell her that it's such a pang-mayaman name and that leon means strong and vita means life so her name means a strong life. Hate pa rin nya. :) So she's more known as "Beth" to the people around her.

2. For most of our lives, we celebrated her birthday on the 4th of February. Nagulat at na-confuse na lang ako nung biglang Feb 5 na raw sya. haha! Sabi nya, "madaling-araw kasi ako ipinanganak."

3. Sa puti n'yang yan at sa kinis ng kilikili nya (inggit), she grew up from a simple agricultural family in the barrio. Walang naniniwala (kahit noon pa) na tumutulong s'yang magtanim at bilad s'ya sa araw.

4. She claims to never have used family planning. It's just amazing how we're all at least 3 years apart.

5. Sa dami ng shoes n'ya ngayon, it's actually her way for compensating on what she missed in her younger years when she had to make do with one pair of school shoes (habang naglalakad along the riles papunta sa school.)

6. Ang kilay niya ay tato. :) Tato talaga ang pagka-spell. And now that she has turned 65, there are times na tinatamad syang magsalamin while lining her brows. So, she ends up using her RED LIPLINER. In fair, keri niya.

she has red lipliner on her brows in this pic :)

7. She's very madasalin. Kahit nakakatulog s'ya sa misa, nagdadasal pa rin 'yan. May panata s'ya sa Penafrancia so she goes home to Bicol every September to fulfill this panata.

8. In my opinion, she's the most bibo and grooviest among the 4 Ortiz siblings. She organizes and gives instructions for the important yearly events like pistang patay. Hehe. :) Somehow, she keeps the family together by saying her piece on important matters and in her own way, helps her 2 brothers and 1 sister. My cousins call her "mama."

9. Her favorite color is violet. This may be the reason why her favorite cake and icecream flavor is ube. Or is it the other way around. And the way she pronounces ube? Remove the t-u-t from the word "tutubi." That's how. :)

10. With momsy, what you see is what you get. Hindi sya mahirap ispelengin. :) She's very vocal, she says what she wants and expresses her opinions talaga. Most of the time, too soon that the kaawa-awang subject is still within earshot. Mababaw lang talaga si mother. Hindi na sya nag-eeffort magpa-deep. This is the reason why she's very easy to please (and very easy to get hurt too.)

There, now that she's 65, nothing much has changed. The numbers have just increased (age, blood sugar, BP at times and available days since she has retired already, dami ng apo etc.). No matter how far we go, me and my kapatids would always go back to momsy. Happy birthday, mader!