A lot of times when I relive my birthstory, I become melancholic. I couldn't believe how God can be so wise and kind. Oftentimes I say it's a story that silences me in deep humility knowing that I couldn't have enjoyed life as it is now without those people whose names I still remember and some of whom will remain faceless to me forever.
After a few days, my mother was released from the hospital to recover at home. It was likely my father learned how to dress the wound since it would be too difficult for them to walk more than a kilometer to the hospital from the house where they lived everytime the wound needs dressing. It's good my father didn't have a problem tending the cut that ran across most of my mother's lower abdomen, more or less six to seven inches in length.
My mother recalls me giving them a hard time as an infant. I would cry so loud and frequently that it made them worry. No amount of amusement would make me stop. Even in the middle of the quietest night, my tiny voice and the parent's worried conversations would fill the neighborhood. There would be times when my grandparents who lived nearby would come over to comfort my mother and help in hushing me to sleep. My wailing gave them many sleepless nights.
But what disturbed my mother so much were the helpless cries of two babies nearby. These were those of the twins whom Mrs. Fitero gave birth who were a few houses away from where my parents lived. My mother says they were probably hungry but their widowed father couldn't provide anything. We were poor but they were more hardened up. One time, my mother asked my father to go and check on the kids. My father came back teary-eyed and with a cracking voice, he said he found the father mashing some pulpy camote and mixed it with evaporated milk to be fed on the babies. My mother almost fainted as she cried.
From then on, the twins Eduardo and Editha and I would share my mother's breastmilk. She would ask the twins to be brought to the house several times during the day and would feed them alternately. I am crying as I write this, I couldn't imagine what more kindness can match this.
I grew up as a kid knowing this story. My mother would always ask me to befriend the twins since the three of us shared the same breast and breastmilk. I am not sure if the twin's father told them our shared past and I don't even know if they ever wondered why I would always smile at them. One day soon, I will find a way to see them and find out what they know about September 9, 1972.
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