It's been 3 days since my new friend was able to join her son and Dutch husband in Rotterdam after her earlier flights were cancelled 3 times since April.
From the airport waiting for her flight, she messaged me:
"Thank you so very much for our wonderful mornings ! Those mornings were the highlights of my day! In my very long zoom meetings, I did not have time anymore to write you a card! But my driver will bring the wine! My thank you wine!"
I never enjoyed walking 10,000 steps more than I did with Tess. Sans a walking buddy, I could only make more than 8000. It is truly more pleasurable to have an exercise buddy. Now I understand how she felt when she told me that after her move to this village she did not jog for a year, she missed her friend from her old place; she then prayed that she be given another.
One of the best things that happened to me in this pandemic was getting to know our neighbors better. We have this chat group that kept us updated with news and provided interaction for common concerns. It is truly a small community.
But Tess stood out because we have a common hobby, I walk while she jogs and walks too. We discovered a lot of common interests; cooking, gardening and so much more. We shared our best recipes, sometimes she would send me a dish peculiar to Samar, that's in southern Philippines where most of their cooking repertoire has coconut milk.
I offered my cabbage diet soup recipe when she wanted to lose 5 kilos. Don't get me wrong, she is not at all big, in fact her figure is perfect; It's just that the fridge was so accessible during this pandemic. The diet was for a week, everyday we did a countdown of her weight until, hooray! She reached her goal.
Then I introduced her to sun gazing, my husband's best ever, tried and tested healing therapy. By looking directly at the sun an hour after sunrise, the eyes absorb its energy. It is believed to energize and rejuvenate the body organs and turns one's vision to high definition. To say that she was hooked is saying it mildly because she also sun gazed at sunset.
Tess taught me to take better pictures, especially of sunrises and sunsets. Would you believe that to include a branch of a palm or a twig of flowers into the scene would create more interesting pictures; be it the sun, the moon or the clouds, making it a true piece of art? Never in my life that I appreciated sunrises and sunsets more than now.
"In pictures, perspective is important", she said. When she gave me a bowl of huge native plums (duhat) almost as big as a teaspoon, I was at loss how to show it's size in a photo. She put 3 pieces on her palm that hardly held them; then on a saucer with a fork. Well, it's never to late to learn, great lesson, Tess.
We took lots of pictures of spectacular and glorious sunrises; but what we love most is a cool and cloudless sunrise. From her balcony, she took flaming gorgeous sunsets while I did the same in my front lawn. At dawn, we captured splendid pictures of a mellowed moon. We photographed beautiful vibrant flowers, unusual plants and trees; birds in forest-like vacant lots full of multi-colored leaves.
Her colorful home changed my mind about flowering plants, particularly bougainvilleas which I learned could be tamed, contrary to my impression that this plant is unruly and wild. Now I'm propagating bougainvilleas from cuttings.
We picked up fallen santol and mangoes. Though she has a very prolific mango tree, she wanted to taste the different varieties found in the enclave. We decided her mangoes were the sweetest.
She is a fashionista, she loves clothes, she likes to dress up in colorful exercise outfits, even her mask and cap, a match. She would tell me she saw a new mask on line that she liked so she ordered several.
I was fascinated when we were walking one day and I started to quote Elizabeth Barrett Browning: " I love you from the depth and breadth...." and she completed it for me. Then she quoted Ralph Waldo Emerson: " If eyes were made for seeing .......And together, we recited: " then beauty is its own excuse for being". Isn't that amazing?
I enjoyed her stories, about her childhood by the beach, of magnificent sunsets and the wonderful sound of waves. Apparently, I'm a little bit hot myself because she enjoyed my stories too. We laughed a lot, about little things and simple things. Once she told me that she likes our topics of conversation because there's no gossip.
Thanks for walking with me this summer, Tess. You're such interesting company. I enjoyed our walks, the stories and the brilliant sunrises. Many thanks too for the twin Beringer red merlot.
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