MANILA, Philippines - She slipped out of their house in an exquisite white eyelet dress right up to her knee. It was simple enough to wear to the mass she attended every morning.

This time, something was different: a tall, dashing, handsome lawyer with Spanish-brown eyes met her a few feet away from her doorstep. He was dressed in an immaculately white suit that was tailored in one of the best ones in Ermita, 1940. Together, they made a quietly smashing pair.

She did go to mass. But it was her wedding mass to Raul.

Juanita and Raul got married in the side altar of the Malate Church with a priest and two witnesses. Then they had breakfast at Aristocrat as their wedding celebration. Raul and Juaning then went off to Baguio for their honeymoon.

Five children came, plus an enchanting house a stone?s throw away from a hill. Nitz and Junie would climb the hill with Vilma, our loving yaya. Erning would stay at home, as cook and housekeeper. She was the ?boss??after Mommy. They still live in our house today.

Poems

Daddy loved nature. When he was studying law at UP Law School, he would write poems and adages to love beneath a coconut tree. So, our house had vast gardens he designed and sculpted with rocks and bushes.

Then, there was the huge terrace made of terra-cotta colored stone and tiles.

And quietly, providing adequate shade was a full-grown guava tree. Mommy and Daddy always sat beneath it on weekends, quietly and serenely talking with each other, always happy and contented. Mommy was always smiling.

Marirose, Georgie and I would play ?House-House? on the adjacent porch. Georgie was the youngest and he was so cute, so I would always pinch both his cheeks. But he liked it, so I went on and on. Mommy sometimes called him ?Georgie-Porgie,? after the nursery rhyme that went:

Georgie-Porgie
Pudding and pie
Kissed the girls and made them cry.
When the boys came out to play,
Georgie-Porgie ran away.

Maybe the little rhyme was referring to a King George or a nobleman who womanized! You know what they say about children?s rhymes and fairy tales?real stories veiled with imagined characters.

But Daddy never ever womanized. Mommy always said she wished her girls would find a husband just like hers. But it was impossible. Daddy was too perfect and, besides, God had lost the mold from which Daddy was made!

The guava tree would bear fruits that ripened to a bright yellow, as Mommy and Daddy talked with each other in the zone of happiness and peace only they knew. They watched Nitz, Junie, myself, Marirose and Georgie run around the terrace like there was no end to childhood.

Beautiful

Mommy always wore red manicure and red lipstick, even under the guava tree. She said you should always be beautiful for your husband especially when he came home from work.

The guavas were now ripe for picking, and trust Erning to concoct a ?sungkit? with a curved nail and a net beneath it to pull the guavas away from the tree and for them to land into the net. Mommy laughed at Erning?s genius.

The next day, we would have ?sinigang sa bayabas.? Yummy. Even for kids.

Mommy and Daddy came from a line of Spaniards. So, if you see us, we have magically colored eyes. Green for Nitz and George, dark brown for Junie and Marirose and, for me, light brown surrounded by a black halo.

No matter the color of our eyes, they never saw Mommy and Daddy sad under the guava tree. Never. Never ever.

It never rained under the Guava Tree.

On Valentine?s Day, the sun shone a little brighter because Daddy would give Mommy a little bit of money, and they would talk and smile Valentine?s Day away.

I wish I had stayed under the Guava tree like Mommy and Daddy. To waited for the fruit to ripen and get picked when it was time.

Then, Daddy?s sonnet to Mommy would also have been mine:

Some star-sown evening, I shall come to you?

a homeless spirit drifting from above,

held to the winglets of the falling dew;

Yes, I shall come and speak to you my love.

The breathless kiss, the passionful embrace

Are coming too to make God-sent and full

My love, my bliss. And when I come, the days

Will hurry into evenings calm and cool

But now, I hold my lips and hold them firm

Against you and your naked beauty though

My heart aloud protests. And oft I squirm

To thaw a steel-desire to break this vow.

But then?to keep intact my faith?I say:

Some star-sown evening I shall find the way.