growing up

growth and development hound me these past few days. since i went to study in the well-known public school near ateneo, i only get to see my siblings - a sister and two brothers all having a one-year difference with the one next to them and i a four-year difference with the oldest of them which is the girl - only during sembreaks and christmas breaks. rarely do i see them during the duration of the sem. that is if there are no holidays on mondays or whatever. besides, even if i could, i can't just go home every weekend because it will be a big burden on our pockets. so i just content myself on getting by without seeing them or my whole family, for that matter, very much. but i'm going farther from what i intended to contemplate about here.

the past year, i've seen those young ones - why karen is 14 yrs. old and in 3rd year high school, rj is a sophomore high school student and kevin is a freshman, all of them in the same high school that i graduated in - grow taller than me and as a result, i end up being teased because i'm shorter than them. hehe, i even wrote that on kevin's profile in friendster which he recently acquired. anyway, last saturday, kevin and mommy happened to stand in front of a full length mirror and it was there kevin saw that he has outgrown mommy already. and so they have, the three of them. the only one that they have yet to outgrow is daddy.

i've had my growth spurt when i was still in elementary so there's no chance of me growing anymore, at least, in lengthwise fashion. i would not want to think what would happen if i increase in size in a crosswise fashion. but those guys have a long way more to go. i wouldn't be surprised if karen would reach the model height of 5'8" (i'd like to see her be a model, too, if that happens), or that kevin would eventually be an advantage to a basketball team because of his height as well as his skills or that rj would have a muscular, toned body in place of all the fats because he no longers grows wider but taller. but more than that, changes within and without them have been taking place.

of karen, we've seen them quite a long time ago when she started menstruating. and nothing much has changed with her attitude. only now that she's a responsible person especially in school because she had a lot of positions in different school organizations and she still has to keep up with her grades and i find her working harder than i ever did back in high school, and she's still in 3rd year. i don't remember myself working ever so hard that year. however, with the two younger boys, their changes are very remarkable nowadays. it must seem so to me because i no longer see them on a daily basis but it's really interesting to see the changes taking place with them. i learned through the mail that kevin has started to wear accessories like necklaces and bracelets as well as shades. it started with just using the body spray ice gave him for his last birthday. then the boys started to acquire more clothes with kevin, our youngest, being more picky with what he wants to wear, just like me. nowadays, he wants his clothes paired, as in terno, like the shirt and the shorts/pants should have something common between them, as my mom has observed. rj doesn't have the same attitude towards clothes, but i observed that he now wears pants more often and that he's now wearing closed shoes to church, as opposed to the open sandals he used to wear.

rj now wants to play basketball usually with kevin. he also has learned to play table tennis. he also just asked me to buy a harmonica and he's making progress, says the music critic in me. he's actually quite clever in discovering how things work and how to go through different puzzles like discovering a way out to the next level in computer games - some things which i admit i'm not very gifted at - though he doesn't really get top grades in school. he also likes to play chess and he's actually gone on to beat me. he's even tried to participate in their last intramurals by playing a match to determine who would be their year level representative. he lost however, due to a mistake in the placing of his queen so he didn't get to play. he has also made a choice of musical preference and has been playing r&b, hiphop and rap tunes here in the house as opposed to my and kevin's penchant for rock music. however, he still has those silly remarks and questions of his as well as his stubborn temper - i can't quite get the exact words to tell you about it yet - which shows that he's not yet fully matured but is well on his way.

kevin has now identified rock artists that he likes though they're still based from mainstream music that reaches our city in packets, and not as a whole. he also just bought a cap, a black one which he says is his favorite color that goes with his black pants and his black rubber shoes. and i don't think he would approve anymore of a semi-kalbo haircut, more so if he knows he's gonna see his friends around. and also due to the pimples on his face, he now sports wackier or goofier or "older" expressions of disbelief on his face. i just saw a picture of his during his birthday last may and it's been a really great change. he still looked like a very innocent child there and now, some seven months later, it's as if a great many years have passed by already. he's also been trying to get me to split with him on a skateboard. he didn't use to ask me for money before but occasionally, now he does, though he isn't an extravagant spender like me. yesterday, i had agreed to an 80-20 split, to which he didn't but just awhile ago, he said he would just buy one with his own money. and yeah, he's been spending a lot more time in front of the mirror, checking his hair, if they were flat or spiky, checking his face for pimples and whatnots, and basically just admiring himself. he's also quite a capable basketball player and a diligent student. he would join karen when the exams are coming up and together, they would conquer the night and burn some midnight oils.

these are just bits and pieces of these guys just at the brink of reaching the peak of puberty. may i have the pleasure of seeing them through and finding out how wonderful people they've become. i ask you all to join me in this endeavor.

                  
                      "i am my brother's keeper"