The following is the eulogy I wrote two years ago when we laid mom to rest. She passed away just a few days after her birthday so her death anniversary is soon. Today, is her 80th birthday which is kind of neat because she was a leap year baby. I’m posting this because the thing writers do best is memorialize the people they love and I did love the way this turned out.

When I was a young girl I thought Mama Inday would live forever. That the woman was so strong, so strong-willed enough that she could just say “not today” and in a way, she did. She was so strong up until the end.

But I’ll come back to that later. Hi, I’m Ruzelle.

Everyone who speaks today will tell stories of how important family was to her, how giving she was. And maybe it’s biased but I feel like no one knows that better than me. I’m the bonus daughter, the extra one. When I was a baby she took me in, for no other reason other than she wanted to. She clothed me, fed me, put me through school, loved me. She always had my back during my hardest moments. She may not have carried me in her womb but she carried me through my life. 

And it wasn’t just me either, it was whoever walked through our front door. She took care of my baby sister to the point where even she calls her mom. She knew all the names of my friends parents. She would have turon or empanada in the freezer waiting to fry when people came over. And if someone I knew for any reason was out of a home, she let them stay in ours even for a little while. 

This is what she taught me – what it meant to be giving without motive. Not because she could say she she did it but because people mattered to her. You don’t retire and go on to become a school nurse if you didn’t. 

She taught me a lot. And not just these big things, these tiny little habits too.

Mom’s the reason I eat cereal at night when I’m hungry (sometimes with avocado), why I love to watch cheesy lifetime movies, why I like making things with my hands to give to people I love.

So maybe you thought it was silly when I said little me used to think that she would live forever but now I know she will. 

Not just in the stories she told us, not just in the stories we’ll tell of her. 

She lives on in the things she taught us. She will live on in the way we take hundreds of photos at holidays. The way we’ll look for sales when we go shopping. The way some of us clean our homes. The way we take care of each other when we’re sick – with lots of bicks and a pot of lugao. These are the same things we teach our children, that they will later teach their own. She will always be here because she is in everything she taught us to do for others and for ourselves.

She is still here. In many ways, she will always be.