This article will appear in my parenting column, ROOT&WINGS, in the Philippine Daily Inquirer on June 1, 2008

Working on this book marked many endings and beginnings. On Tuesday, June 3, 2008 my son marks his 10th year in heaven. This book will also be, by God’s grace the beginning of a new chapter in “my year of books”. It also ends, and closes a chapter of my life that began in childhood with the loss of a dear friend. Truly, God is awesome and mysterious in His ways and for that I am truly grateful. To God be all the glory!

I think the most confident stage of takes place when one is in the mid-life years.

Although it can also be the most turbulent and trying of years, a lot of women find their most memorable moments as mothers, wives, and career women, happen during this life stage.

The Maryknoll College High School Class of 1984 (MCHS84), together with Nivea, put together a wonderful compilation of heartwarming and inspiring women stories – takes of women ages 35 – 65 on their life journeys on love, life, courage and success in a book, aptly titled, “Age of Confidence”.

The thread that binds these 4o women is that they were all, at some point in their lives, a student at Maryknoll College. However, one need not have been a Maryknoller to fully appreciate the depth of these women’s experiences. The reader can easily identify, possibly find parts of herself in the stories written here. Lawyer Gaby Roldan Concepcion in her story, “Late Bloomer’ talks about the experience of choosing family over work – “There comes a point in life when one is painfully called to set priorities, to make agonizing choices. To ignore the call would be to lead several frenetic existences where one would not make the cut. More than anything, I could not stand the thought that one day; I would wake up to find I had missed all the firsts in my children’s lives.” Writer and TV host Deeedee Sytangco recalls her husband’s difficult last days in “Love Never Ends” – “I dropped out of the world to take care of my beloved. IT was a choice I wholeheartedly made. We had come to think alike and I knew he did not want anyone else to care for him. I was always within his reach as he demanded, so he could hold on to me during those long dark nights of intense pain and fear.”

Many issues are confronted when one reaches midlife and as Marie Buhain, a developmental psychologist and member of MCHS84 describes it in the book – “If ever we are going to become who we truly are, now is the time to do it. It means letting go of many self-definitions we have made for ourselves and breaking free from those that have been handed down to us. Midlife passage is an entranceway into the deepest recesses of our soul… Allowing this transformation to unfold liberates and empowers life contained within, thus granting confidence and beauty that glimmers.”

There are many gems to be picked up from the lives of the 40 women whose stories comprise this book. For all her successes at CNN, news producer Armie Jarin Bennet still considers raising her children her greatest achievement. Talent manager Girlie Rodis, in her story “Lessons My father Taught Me” shares, “My father’s life reminds me that life being what it is, will not always give us a smooth road. It is a lesson that keeps me grounded.” PDI columnist Isabel Berenguer Asuncion writes in “Full Circle”, “I now understand that one can never love to a fault. The beauty of life is that it unfolds and offers its grace in ways that allow us to find ourselves, in its own time and pace, and only because it moves in tandem with what resonates within us.”

MCHS84 is a class rich with its own share of loss, courage and pain. Jinky Dimayuga Ferrer lost her 10 year old son Inno to an accident on Christmas day. She was only 30years old. Two other classmates – Marge Evangelist Jardiolin and Dr.Yvette Talusan – Tomacruz, both cancer survivors with amazing stories teach us about the blessings of great faith and love in the face of insurmountable odds.

Early this year, when MCHS84 approached me to edit this book, I was immediately drawn to it. However, as most projects go, at some point in the road, I almost wanted to throw in the towel. But things worked out, and with everyone pulling together, the book was completed in record time. This is one truly amazing, group of women. Towards the end of the project, when the final draft was sent to me together with the Dedication page, I was dumbfounded and close to tears with my discovery.

There, on the Dedication page was the name of a classmate of theirs who had passed on early in life. Maria Estella De las Alas. Lala, as I knew her, was my best friend in Kindergarten when I first entered Maryknoll. However, after a year, she fell seriously ill with a kidney ailment and was held back by two years. She eventually returned to school and became a part of what is now MCHS84. Sadly, she passed on at the age of nine. I can still remember to this day how the announcement of her death over the school PA system drove me to tears. I knew she had been sick but her death came as a complete shock. My parents did not allow me to attend her wake because they felt it would be best for me to remember her alive. Life has a way of working things out and closure can come many decades later. I am thankful that through this book I was able to remember and say a proper good-bye to a friend who was a big part of my childhood.

For information on AGE OF CONFIDENCE, please email miatarrayo@gmail.com

Email the author at cathybabao@gmail.com

For more photos on the book launch, please visit my album here.