When I Grow Up
My mom said I was five when I first told her what I wanted to be when I grew up. She said I told her I wanted to be a beauty queen. She said she enjoyed the moments when I wore her dresses, used her make-up and walked around the house like I'm in a pageant. She also said my dad went nuts about the whole make-up thing that he believed is a very potent baby skin destroyer. I clearly don't remember anything about telling my mom that I wanted to be a beauty queen but what the hell! I don't want to accuse my mom of lying to me and I was five years old. It's either the awesome memories after my fifth year deleted the ones before it or I'm just too stubborn to eat vegetables which my mom insisted are good for sharpening the memory.
After giving up watching Bb. Pilipinas pageants on television, I became closer to my dad. My mom even had this little hunch about me ending up a lesbian but it obviously didn't come true so forget it. One night, my dad told me about my late grandfather's frustration. "Ang gusto talaga ni Tatay maging doktor," he said. He went on explaining the inconvenience of the situation during my grandpa's time that didn't allow the realization of his dream. I came out of that talk wanting to be a doctor not only because I want to make my grandpa's dream come true. At the age of six, I wanted to be rich by healing people. That dream didn't die inside me until I reached high school.
High school was pretty crazy. I was a new student to the high school I went to and I was kind of different so there were a lot of people I came to mess up with inside the classroom. For some reason, Christian Living and History teachers in that high school love watching their students try to rip out each other's throats by making them debate over some issue. That time, I loved defending my stand against some narrow-minded teenagers who happened to be in the same class as me and I won most of the time. My teachers worshiped me for it but my skills weren't badass enough to land me a position in the high school debate team. I didn't give a damn. That was when the third dream came sprouting out. I wanted to be a lawyer.
My dad and I used to laugh together at my classmates' lousy arguments after I got home from school. He was happy enough to spill me the inside information about all the topics our teachers often give us for debates. After all, he's my coach. He's the reason I won most arguments inside the classroom. That was when I told him that maybe law was for me. He froze and then he said, "Lawyers are professional liars. Hindi lang galing sa pagsasalita ang kailangan mo pagdating sa law." I knew he was trying to talk me out of the first real dream I came up with for myself but somehow, I didn't hate him for it. Taking up premed and eventually going on to med school was perfectly fine to me. As soon as we're done talking about lawyers and the law, I dropped the dream.
What came after kicking ass in debates is basically a big blur. I really don't remember wanting to be anything else after I decided I wanted to be a lawyer. There were little dreams in between like wanting to be a singer after I discovered my talent in singing and music in general, wanting to be a novelist after I remembered the novel I tried to write when I was 12 years old, wanting to be a professor after I won three consecutive best student teacher awards and wanting to be a professional billiards player after I got addicted to playing the sport. My lineage of evolving dreams stopped after I graduated from high school only to be revived in my college years.
I decided to follow what my late dad wanted for me. I took up a premedical course in college. Since then, all I have in my head is wanting to be one of the best neurologists in the world. Unfortunately, the world doesn't seem to approve of that. I graduated from a premedical course only to teach what I learned to students who won't give a damn about chromosomes and how a simple malfunctioning of them can destroy lives. I'm not really sure if I wanted that.
Right now, I really don't have a dream. I just want to be rich. That's all.
And this is when I say when I grow up, I want to be able to slap hard cash on the faces of those hypocrites who said my mom wasn't good enough for my dad.
After giving up watching Bb. Pilipinas pageants on television, I became closer to my dad. My mom even had this little hunch about me ending up a lesbian but it obviously didn't come true so forget it. One night, my dad told me about my late grandfather's frustration. "Ang gusto talaga ni Tatay maging doktor," he said. He went on explaining the inconvenience of the situation during my grandpa's time that didn't allow the realization of his dream. I came out of that talk wanting to be a doctor not only because I want to make my grandpa's dream come true. At the age of six, I wanted to be rich by healing people. That dream didn't die inside me until I reached high school.
High school was pretty crazy. I was a new student to the high school I went to and I was kind of different so there were a lot of people I came to mess up with inside the classroom. For some reason, Christian Living and History teachers in that high school love watching their students try to rip out each other's throats by making them debate over some issue. That time, I loved defending my stand against some narrow-minded teenagers who happened to be in the same class as me and I won most of the time. My teachers worshiped me for it but my skills weren't badass enough to land me a position in the high school debate team. I didn't give a damn. That was when the third dream came sprouting out. I wanted to be a lawyer.
My dad and I used to laugh together at my classmates' lousy arguments after I got home from school. He was happy enough to spill me the inside information about all the topics our teachers often give us for debates. After all, he's my coach. He's the reason I won most arguments inside the classroom. That was when I told him that maybe law was for me. He froze and then he said, "Lawyers are professional liars. Hindi lang galing sa pagsasalita ang kailangan mo pagdating sa law." I knew he was trying to talk me out of the first real dream I came up with for myself but somehow, I didn't hate him for it. Taking up premed and eventually going on to med school was perfectly fine to me. As soon as we're done talking about lawyers and the law, I dropped the dream.
What came after kicking ass in debates is basically a big blur. I really don't remember wanting to be anything else after I decided I wanted to be a lawyer. There were little dreams in between like wanting to be a singer after I discovered my talent in singing and music in general, wanting to be a novelist after I remembered the novel I tried to write when I was 12 years old, wanting to be a professor after I won three consecutive best student teacher awards and wanting to be a professional billiards player after I got addicted to playing the sport. My lineage of evolving dreams stopped after I graduated from high school only to be revived in my college years.
I decided to follow what my late dad wanted for me. I took up a premedical course in college. Since then, all I have in my head is wanting to be one of the best neurologists in the world. Unfortunately, the world doesn't seem to approve of that. I graduated from a premedical course only to teach what I learned to students who won't give a damn about chromosomes and how a simple malfunctioning of them can destroy lives. I'm not really sure if I wanted that.
Right now, I really don't have a dream. I just want to be rich. That's all.
And this is when I say when I grow up, I want to be able to slap hard cash on the faces of those hypocrites who said my mom wasn't good enough for my dad.
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