Glorious glory

Netnet Camomot .

I DON’T like Christmas songs. But that’s all I hear now in malls, stores, restos. I’m living in the wrong country? Hmmm. But I do like noche buena and media noche—lechon, ham, grapes, champagne, and Fablues’ battered chicken and potato salad. Yum!

And I don’t like to decorate but I love staring at a Christmas tree and its blinking lights. Which reminds me of this story about a car owner asking his friend to please check if the car’s rear signal lights are working. So, his friend goes outside to the back of the car and says, Yes, no, yes, no, yes, no…

In case you’re still wondering what that story is all about, try a reenactment with your car, and then wait for the eureka moment. Aha!

Christmas is for families, true friends, the exchange gift, cool weather, parties and reunions. It’s the gold dust stuck in your hair after dropping by the store’s Christmas section. Touch your hair and the gold dust is now on your fingers, giving it the Midas touch. Gold dust is like colds—contagious, viral.

As viral as the “Glorious” trailer which attracted six million views in one day. Wow. Trailer pa lang na.

“Glorious” is the love story of 52-year-old Glory (Angel Aquino) and 20-ish—30 years younger—Niko (Tony Labrusca). I don’t know if the trailer’s six million viewers were all women above 50, but it’s glorious for a woman of a certain age to have a lover who can keep up with her cravings and desires.

But if this movie were made for Lent, its topic would be the Glorious Mysteries.

The generation gap is still alive and kicking despite the cougars in this oh so judgmental world where an older woman with a much younger man is no puede, but an older man with a much younger woman is puedeng-puede.

But for Glory and Niko, there are no rules. Until concerned citizens begin to nag them about rules.

A romantic relationship is indeed a glorious experience. Twinkling eyes and blooming looks in the first few weeks when you can almost touch the couple’s heart-shaped thought bubbles. If only that initial spark can last forevermore.

In 2016, former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s comeback through the House of Representatives somehow blessed her with blooming looks as an additional perk, and when asked about her beauty secrets, she said, “Freedom is always very healthy.”

She was, of course, referring to her freedom from hospital detention and perhaps also from her neck brace which became one more tactic—in addition to the ever reliable wheel chair—for a politician to avoid a jail cell.

Now, Arroyo is House Speaker as she continues to bloom like a sweet sixteen despite her 71 years in this oh so beautiful world.

Maria Clara is the ideal Filipina as written by Jose Rizal in his “Noli Me Tangere.” Beautiful, true, and strong. Like a saint. Unless your basis of comparison is Santo Rodrigo per President Rody Duterte’s unsolicited advice: “Get hold of a picture of mine, ‘yan ang ilagay niyo sa altar—Santo Rodrigo.”

Each Catholic has a favorite saint whose intercession he seeks when he needs enlightenment.

Faith is the main ingredient of a person’s survival. It could be faith in oneself for the noneligious type. It inspires a person to believe that he can face any challenge and come out of it intact. If a Catholic hears Mass, prays the Holy Rosary and his novenas, and becomes a better person through his daily prayers, then great, everybody wins.

But if he’s still gossiping and destroying other people’s lives despite his daily prayers, well, asa na ang hustisya ani? He’s Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde then. Angel on the outside, devil on the inside, and this could be the worst enemy of Angel’s Glory as she and Niko become favorite subjects of gossip in their barangay. He’s 30 years younger. She could be older than his parents. Gasp! Que horror! Que barbaridad!

But the Pinoy should learn to mind his own business because everyone is human after all: “I’m only human/Of flesh and blood I’m made.”

The Holy Rosary is not only a prayer but a meditation on one’s life as each person has his own Joyful, Sorrowful, Glorious and Luminous Mysteries. By praying the Rosary, he realizes he’s not alone in his struggles as everyone goes through life’s trials and tribulations, and there’s no exception to that general rule.

‘Tis the season for the Joyful Mysteries, though, now that Christmas is here. But with “Glorious,” a woman of a certain age can now be profoundly joyful as long as she has the freedom to love and be loved.