A sage of long ago scribbled a two-sentence phrase that has metamorphosed immortal in the books and comes leaping out of the pages every time a year recedes or passes away into oblivion.
And this scholar, who remains anonymous until today, but his compelling words remaining immortal, penned:
“Divine oblivion to the gentle shade,”
“The sun has lit thee out of Time, to fade. . .”
Like the last period of mortality, it tells us time must have its end. It then tells us the performance of a duty, the proper employment of time, the season to all others, best calculated to fill the mind with serious reflection.
As there is a time to say hello, so, there is a time to say “babay yu!”
Ay! So, shall be the chorus for Year 2022” “Hasta la vista or sayonara Year 2022 on your retirement. You earned it well.
Just like the first time when you appeared and mortals said “Fare thee well,” just as Year 2021 packed up his suitcase and left, so shall we say again “Fare thee well” to your leaving.
To you, Year 2022, like the marching hours of a creaky employee or daily worker reaching his/ her prime, your laboring days have drawn up. The clock struck twelve marking January 1, 2023 and immediately, you began your travel to the road of eternity.
For many in Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR) and Region 01, 2022 had been their interpose, through whose favors beings – living and those who went beyond the horizon – derived the means of time.
For Cordillerans and lowlanders whose lives year 2022 touched most sensitively and their spirits having felt a kind of exhilaration, it is but natural they feel a hankering for its parting. For those who think the year 2022 gave them bad luck that they even have lost their indigenous sense of humor, it is, but again natural, they wish the year “speed on.”
Now, Daily Laborer found out last week that a group of widows – ages ranging from 45 and above – gathered around 2022’s last moment and watched the old man year with due feeling and consecrated the old man’s memory with partial evocation.
Interested to know why they did so, Daily Laborer latched on to one of the widows and timidly asked. And the widow who refused to be identified at first refused to reveal the reason why they formed a group to consecrate the memory of Year 2022.
But the Daily Laborer persisted. Knowing Daily Laborer cannot be denied, the widow intimately pinched Daily Laborer, here, there, somewhere and everywhere, giggled and said, “Year 2022 gave us (she and her co-widow friends) a chance to blossom like roses again and be like young girls.”
“What do you mean?” Daily Laborer pressed, perplexed. The widow explained, “Well, to be truthful about it, some men have been courting us for the past months and hopefully they will continue doing so . . . and we will encourage them to do so. . .”
Aaaaah! Oh, well . . . hope springs eternal, indeed. . .
Tarras Palintang, residing at La Trinidad, Benguet and engaged in homegrown livelihood business lengthily explained to Daily Laborer in the Kankana-ey tongue on reflecting on the passing of 2022.
Palintang explained how many thousands among us have murdered the year 2022 as it passed from its zenith cradle, be-gemmed in the first, young, early dawning of midnight January with pillars of cold, and how many have abused 2022 to their mortification and loss.
Palintang, on the other hand, whispered to Daily Laborer that 2022 has proven a friend to those who sought its friendship during the year’s varieties of its youthful stature and its riper delicacies of a summer beauty.
Another, Jonard Sadpikan, from Nueva Vizcaya, a heavy truck operator moving consumer goods to destinations, explained to witless Daily Laborer year 2022 brought the mild and bleak conformities of typhoons, the aid of heaven’s sunshine, starlight and moonlight. It has rendered, like the centuries of years which have preceded it, a monumental shrine worthy of benevolence.
Sadpiken, who can sermon like a priest to wayward congregants like Daily Laborer, when it gets his fancy, further murmured that we pay our devotion in the hope that the same Giver of years will sustain us to behold the infant successor, Year 2023, in health peace and thankfulness.
Still another, Lalla Camilos, from La Union, recently came to Baguio as local tourist, said to Daily Laborer as she eye-shopped or window-shopped at the goods placed at Malcolm Square, Baguio City: “In casting a retrospective glance over the year that has passed, we recall its pleasures and its pains and the various occurrences with which it has been distinguished.”
She continued, “If, perchance, one has been called to sustain the loss of friends, it is with melancholy reflection that we renew the New Year.”
Meliton Palingi, a student in Baguio City, in waving goodbye to year 2022, likens 2022 as hours he derived from hours of learning, duty, recreation, of affliction and improved character in the beauty of thought and deed through studious habit of acquiring knowledge.
Another student, Alliya Liladres, a graduate now looking for work but somehow luck eluding her, soberly described 2022’s passing as a beloved and fond parent now gone, but had been a twelve months’ companion to her, in shade or sun, in bustle or in silence, in light or in darkness. That somehow, Liladres knew, the warmth of 2022 will somehow rub on 2023 for her to finally land a job and tide her over from her predicament.
“The winds, the voice and the waters of my tears will bear the year 2022, out of Time,” Liladres wistfully said to Daily Laborer. The pandemic had scorched the lives of the family of Liladres.
Hearing Liladres forced Daily Laborer to think of the pandemic of the past year, of many cut off like blighted blossoms in the coursing months, many have dreamt but are now gone before year 2022, as heralds of account.
Many an April, May or June-like maiden bride in ease and loveliness, and many a sanguine youth have sickened and fallen like withered shadows to the vernal earth.
And Daily Laborer cannot but shake his head and silently address Year 2022, saying, “Year 2022, I know it’s no fault of yours, yet, you cannot boast of the hundred turfs which have been raised upon the bright coffins and altars of affection, yet you, 2022, will be but only one year added to the predecessor, 2021, when the pandemic started.”
“The pandemic lingered for 2022. What volumes have been told of its doings against bright life? What scrolls are not yet discovered, what secrets unraveled and how vast a mass of humans confronted a killer no future years will decipher where it really originated, either for the curious, the learned and the scientific community.”
In casting a retrospective glance over the year that has passed, we recall its pleasures and its pains and the various occurrences with which it has been distinguished. If, perchance, one you
Yet in all, those who spoke with Daily Laborer in bidding adieu to Year 2022 say they cast their tribute to the Old Man Year’s feet, to his peaceful smile – like the gleam of a sunset – begets their hopes, and their coming future years will be spent meritorious as they have spent it in 20222.
Barcelon Motiles, an elder who lives with his children in Baguio City said, “The old year has passed. It has carried with it many companions and friends. They have ceased. They have gone before me. When I shall be summoned to follow, I know not. But it is my duty to be ready.”
So, the curtains of the sky have drawn around 2022. The winds have already anticipated his exit. And it looks like the funeral gloom of Nature round the horizon has been suspended. For sympathy has replaced sorrow.
2022’s mandate has forth and nature and humans should be happy. He has fulfilled twelve months of impossible tasks. His last job was to usher in the entry of 2023. And he has done it in reverberating tones.
The pearl has announced the young 2023’s entrance. As we welcome him, likewise do we say, too, “Farewell” to Year 2022.
On commencing the New Year, it is not only our duty but our privilege to offer up our grateful praises to the Ultimate One up above Who Makes all new years, the Preserver, Benefactor and Friend.
Transient as the cloud on which the sunbeam of the morning played, has been the glory of the receding year, so shall it be for the ensuing year and be more abiding.
