I Love My Husband

I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life! --- and, if God grants,
I shall but love thee better after death!!
From the poem “How Do I Love Thee” by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Since we’d been living overseas, I’d been returning to Toronto in the summers to look after my parents. In one of those times, I overheard my parents while I hung out in their room. My mother (then at the beginnings of her Alzheimer’s) said, “What am I going to do with my head? What if I can no longer remember you?” My father then said, “You can forget everything, just don’t forget me.”

Years later, as her sickness progressed, it became very apparent that she had forgotten most things and most people (including us, her children). At one of her neurologist’s check-up, she was asked the same questions from the years before: “Where are you? What day is it? What is the month? What city are you in? What is this (holding a pen)? What is it used for?” And for the last question, my mother motioned with her hand that it was for writing. The word “writing” wouldn’t come to her. The doctor then wrote the word “BLINK” on a piece of paper and asked her to do it. She did so.

As I watched, I was very relieved that she was able to do at least one thing correctly! Then, the doctor asked her to write a sentence. It seemed like we all held our breaths. My father, their caregiver, and I, waited to see what she wrote. Finally, she held out her paper to the doctor who asked her to read her work. She smiled and proudly said, “I love my husband.”

I treasured that memory in my heart. I actually cried while there. I understood the significance that although she had forgotten most things (including how to eat!), she remembered the most important thing to her: love. In their 50th Wedding Anniversary album she dedicated the poem above to my father. She said it best described her love for him. It was as if she knew she would die first. Had she kept living, they would have celebrated their 64th Wedding Anniversary on September 12th.

“Moments of Peace for the Morning” by Bethany House says that “if you love others, God – the source of love – lives in you. The more you practice His unfailing love, the more His presence is perfected in you. The blessing of love is twofold. Love others, and not only will your love grow, but God – the spring from which all love flows – will show Himself more powerfully within you.”

And that was what was evident in my mother; her love for God, my father, us - her children, grandchildren, flowers, music, cleanliness and order, their church, teaching, studying, etc.

So, although much can be said about her, I wrote of her love. She was next in line for EARIST’s (an institute of Science and Technology in Manila) presidency and she loved her job dearly but she quit it to be with us in Canada. She said she loved her family more. By then, she was the Vice President of the university and Dean of its Graduate School.

She also wrote of her thankfulness to God for His countless blessings and for being the giver of gifts and lives well lived. She desired for us to have the same happiness she had.

I never knew until she died, half of what she did and accomplished. She lived her life well. I will remember most of all how she swayed us as she had her arm around my shoulders while I played the piano. It was a joy to be with her as she sang with gusto to the music. Then, she kissed me, thanked me, and told me she loved me. Thank you, Lord, that you shared her with us. It is comforting to know that she is with you and basking in your love.

Liwayway (Lily) Nora Angeles (Nanay)
March 10, 1924 – September 9, 2012

May the Lord make your love for each other and for everyone else grow by leaps and bounds. 1 Thessalonians 3:12 CEV