Got MILF?

I’ve been married for 15 years to a MILF who just turned 40.

And throughout the 15 years we’ve been together, we’ve experienced just about all kinds of fuck-ups imaginable, unimaginable, and everything else in between.

Before we became an item, I had to invent a story about me having sex with a total stranger in a party that never happened just so my girlfriend at the time would initiate a break-up. I know, I know. It was cruel and twisted, but the relationship really wasn’t going anywhere anymore and I didn’t have the heart to be the one to do the splitting-up, so there. (To every rumor-mongering shithead out there from our old college crowd who conjectured and assumed this and that about the whole affair, here, finally, is the version – the true one, mind you – that you assholes were never privy to, so…tangina niyo ngayong lahat, kung sinu-sino man kayo, hahaha.)

To her credit, Cindy was absolutely averse to the possibility of becoming an “other woman,” but she never told me to break it off with my ex. She just told me to think things through and told me right after I made my intentions clear that she wasn’t going to see me anymore. In spite of having the same feelings for me, she just couldn’t approve of the circumstances. Of course, just like any other guy would, I took those words to mean that she wanted me to become single and available again as soon as possible. (An imputation that she vehemently denies to this day, haha.)

So I did the diabolical deed. And after all the psycho-emotional shit I had to go through, the first words of endearment she offered upon my arrival (which, of course, signaled my availability as per her vehemently denied “terms and conditions”) were: “Ano’ng nangyari sa buhok mo?” (Note: “Go figure,” has since entered my Hall of Fame for frequently used marital expressions.)

From that point onwards, and as I’ve already mentioned, we started experiencing fuck-ups of every kind imaginable, imaginable, (and everything else in between) for the next 15 years, and here’s a list of some, I suppose, of the most, well…unforgettable for her:

• She made love with me in a lot of wrong places during the most inopportune times, and as a result, we put a bun in her oven just half a year into our relationship;

• She had to go against her parents’ wishes by supporting my uber-cool decision to get married at the open-air chapel of the National Arts Center in Mount Makiling (because I fell in love with the place back in 1985 when I was still an undergrad in UPLB);

• During the 7th month of her first pregnancy, she contracted chicken pox from a careless, crazy, college friend. As a result, our baby went into distress, began to breathe in the shit she began to dump in the amiotic fluid, and had to be taken out via C-section.

• She married a “rockstar” who preferred reaping critical nationwide recognition to monetary rewards that could have gotten us featured on MTV Cribs (?!?) Having images of birthday-suited groupies offering their love juices during substance-abusive gigs also irritatingly heightened marital tensions from time to time – all of which never really helped at all on the peace-of-mind front;

• She helped me set up a volatile business venture that keeled over after just two short years of operation. It cost us more than what we bargained for in terms of finances and sanity; though we’re still reeling from the effects, they’re already starting to fade away like a bad, passing migraine;

• Just a little over a year ago, we lost a fickle-minded, longtime nanny. Being that I was the one earning significantly less, I had to quit teaching so I could look after the kids. (At the time, our youngest was just about to turn 2 yrs old.) Cindy had to burden the responsibility of being the sole family breadwinner until we could find a suitable replacement nanny, which we still haven’t to this day;

• In spite of her being utterly deserving of it, she’s never been consistently pampered as a wife mainly because we’re both teachers in a country that’s been run by a succession of inept and/or corrupt shitheads who’ve only paid lip service to teachers since whenever. It’s only been lately that we’ve been able to get our bearings back, tentative thanks to the fact that we’ve had to (temporarily) give up our vocation in order to earn insanely better bucks at jobs we’re insanely overqualified for;

• She’s an uber-hot MILF who’s constantly been the target of both pre- and post-pubescent wankers. It’s a good thing she intimidates half the schmucks who adore and/or lust for her because she’s got even more brains than I do. (Oh, and did I already mention that she’s a feminist?) As for the other half of the club, they normally scurry off like the inconsequential vermin they are upon realizing the immortal music demigod she’s married to;

• She almost came close to letting me go because of all the shit that we tossed each other as a result of our financial worries. It didn’t help either that we had to deal with quite a lot of extra shit from a number of rumor-mongering “you-can’t-choose-’em” delusional family members who got busy busy-bee-ing the chakadoo channels and started spreading around stories of how dipshittably irresponsible we were as parents. (Ah, my deeeeepest condolences to you uncool and unloved who’ve found meaning in life by becoming 2nd-class trophy wives.)

The list can go on, of course, but I guess I’ll just leave it at this: Cindy’s been through a lot of holy (and unholy) shit and she may argue like hell with me from time to time and keep on reminding me about crap I did even from as far back as 1993, but whatever destiny has seen fit to throw across her path thus far has just made it possible for her to come up with even more ways for us to just love each other to death until the end of whatever.

The shit we’ve been through together got me into thinking about how I’ve never subscribed to the thought that we’re not really in control of the things we do; that we’re playing out a drama whose plot is just a subplot of a subplot in a divine comedy of errors running on a pre-programmed network sched; that whatever freedoms we exercise are just part of the grand illusion of control that we convince ourselves of having in order to stave off the insanity that would surely ensue from believing otherwise.

But what if it is fate?

After 75 years worth of blood-curdling wisdom brought about by 50 years worth of weirdly enlightening experiences in the short span of a tumultuous 15-year on-and-almost-off relationship, does “Muffy” still have enough fight left in her insanely cool, lovey-dovey, cutie-patootie personage to take on something as supposedly predictably unpredictably predictable as destiny?

Haha…what else is new? She’s cool like dat.

Before we end, a little FYI: MILF doesn’t stand for what you might think it does, dear reader. It’s “Muffy I‘ll Love Forever.” Stinky-cheesy, yes. But then, we all know what connoisseurs say about cheese, right?

Happy 40th, Cinds. I am; You are; We met…

…and we’re still here.