Tears, sadness

There's no more Miriam.  I remember shortly before I turned 18 in 1992 and there she was running for President. I attended her Bacolod rally and all but I couldn't vote as the election was in May and I was turning 18 in June. I really thought she was going to win. She lead in the beginning and was overtaken, in a dodgy come from behind victory of the eventual 12th President. 

In '95, I wrote only her name in the ballot for senator and left the other slots blank.  Then I lost hope in the national elections when the electorate voted Joseph Estrada into power.  I realised majority of the people don't really like smart guys.  Miriam was too much of a brain -- the grades, the honors, the degrees.  That she  wasn't a bar topnotcher made her at least human.  She mentioned her academic accomplishments whenever she could and of course that turned off a lot of people who maybe couldn't even write a proper sentence.  She had difficulties embracing humility.  For the likes of me who's hardly smart, she could do with the bragging. 

She also sided with Arroyo and Estrada, that was a conundrum.  Edsa 2 didn't exactly transform the Philippines into Singapore. Neither did Daang Matuwid straightened the mess that was the Manila traffic or the National Bilibid Prison.  Maybe she believed she was in full health to run for president and had the son of martial law executor as running mate. Had they become friends as colleagues in the senate? I don't follow the logic of that decision.  But then Philippine politics is hard to follow.  There's always a bottom line. 

What she elucidated in hindsight has always been right, we should change ourselves and make good choices like when given the chance of an education, to strive to excel, or to read books, or to have that moral turpitude.  

It wasn't her destiny to be President.  When I think of Ramos now, I could only think of a place in Taguig. While Madam Miriam became a stellar legislator. She even survived voting against the popular vote in that impeachment process (when my friend Joy texted me, "are you still in awe with Miriam?), during the turn of the millennium which lost her the 2001 election.  But she bounced back in her next two elections I would only view from afar.  She became popular with young people and as a commencement speaker.  I wasn't really into those popular quotes but it made a few laugh and would lighten up events like graduation exercises or tv interviews. 

That is life.  She wasn't meant to reach 72.  She was a colourful character. Ahay. Kasubo guid.