Finding St. Joseph

Ma Hilda asked Nai on the first day of Simbang Gabi if Miguel could play Joseph for the midnight mass Christmas eve at Bahay Pag-ibig. To this, Miguel refused outright. I told Nai I'll talk to Miguel later but she beat me to it one lunch when she brought it up again. On a stroke of genius, she offered a month's worth of the Kiddie bundle (Cartoon Network, Nickelodeon, Disney Channel) over cable if he would agree to be St. Joseph. You could tell by Miguel's eyes that the bargain was a very good one so I piped in to say that if he says yes that very moment (I was done eating) I would drive over to Nepo Mall and pay for the cable service at ACCTN. And so we had St. Joseph.

A trip to the palengke after consulting with Ma Hilda and asking  the tailor if he will still accept the job produced the required material. This was Sunday, the 19th. After bringing them to the tailor, Wednesday was promised as the due date. Nai got busy that day and so we went to the tailor Thursday only to find out that the costume was not yet done because both the green  and cream cloth were kulang. This was around 10 in the morning. So braving the traffic, we went back to the market to get the extra material and returned to the tailor 11:30. He promised he'd be done between 1 and 2, which of course he wasn't when we got there. It was 2:30 when we finally drove off with the costume. Choir practice was scheduled at 2 while the kids' practice was at 3. After freshening up a little, it was off to the chapel for rehearsals. When we got back after 5, Nai gave the bad news that Ma was in the hospital due to hypertension. "Midnight" mass was at 9 where Miguel played Joseph remarkably well. This after all involved sitting on a stool by the altar for the duration of the celebration, and this he did with nary an extraneous movement for over and hour and a half. (Imagine for example Gabriel in the same place).  And so we went to the hospital after mass when visiting hours were over. The guard did let in visitors three at a time so Nai went with Miguel and Tang, for the first round, while Aya and Stella took the next round. Aya played an angel over at the Lord's Transfiguration in L&S. Both she and Miguel went up to Ma in their full costumes. Noche buena followed at Villa where Stella had cooked lengua, spaghetti and salmon belly. By the time we were off to Cavite it was 1:00 in the morning. At 2:30 a.m. we pulled in to the driveway of Auntie Cording's to find Ate and Mom still awake. We finally went to bed 3 a.m. Christmas morning.

After spending Christmas eve in hospital with Tang, Ma came home right next day, to everyone's relief.Christmas 2010 photos