Msgr. Alfredo C. Yllana

"I'LL SAY YOUR BIRTHDAY MASS AND BLESS YOUR HOUSE"

An Update on my uncle Msgr. Alfredo C. Yllana

Ma. Andrea Yllana Santos-Mendigo

My birthday on September 12, 1992 was approaching, and Mamo Fred knew it. He told me "Baby, I'll say your birthday Mass with Siching, but 1 will be the one to bless your house because Siching has great difficulty climbing stairs. At that time, Mamo Fred was in the pink of health. He was energetic, strong and busy. In contrast, his older brother by some seven years, Mamo Siching was sickly and heavy, each step for him an obstacle to be overcome.

Mamo Fred didn't get the chance to fulfill his promise. On September 9, he was found unconscious on the floor of his bedroom after he had failed to appear for the 7 a.m. Mass. The parishioners of the National Shrine of the Sacred Heart at Dao, Makati, where he was guest priest, had become concerned, because he was usually very punctual.  Mamo Fred had had a severe stroke on his left temporal lobe, which nearly took his life. It left him paralyzed on his right side and unable to articulate his thoughts. After two months of confinement (he went from Makati Medical to St. Luke's to Cardinal Santos), he was ready for discharge.

My mother, Andrea, and my family lived in the same house in St. Ignatius Village, and we volunteered to take Mamo Fred in, to care for him. He came home shortly before his birthday November 7. Mamo Siching had a few days to prepare a grand homecoming, where more than 10 priests concelebrated Mass in the small foyer of our home, and close friends were invited for the dinner afterwards. For all of us, that Mamo Fred was still alive was a miracle. In fact, Mamo Siching had already prepared his tomb in the Yllana plot in Penafrancia when doctors in St. Luke's could not give a prognosis for the comatose Mamo Fred. (Ironically, it was Mamo Siching who was buried there on January⁷ 2, 1994, with Mamo Fred in attendance. On the other hand, on my birthday in 1993, it was Mamo Siching who climbed the stairs of our home to bless all the rooms while Mamo Fred sat in the foyer, watching. El hombre propone y Dios despone.)

Mamo Fred had been a great preacher and a singer with a good baritone voice. I remember, in the '80's, when we fetched him from a parish in Sausalito, where he was doing his mission appeal for the Archdiocese of Nueva Caceres (at that time, my husband and I were living in San Francisco, California), the parish priest told me, "Your uncle had them eating out of his hand." He was chaplain of many Bicolano communities in the U.S., with whom he would celebrate the feast of Our Lady of Penafrancia in September. The death of Mamo Siching was a blow to Mamo Fred. The older brother had doted on the younger, often teasing him. I remember Mamo Siching joking once, "This brother of mine has very expensive taste. He gargled my perfume!" Apparently, Mamo Fred had mistaken the perfume for mouthwash. When my mother died in 1996, Mamo Fred attended her funeral, walking. A few days later, he called me to his room. After many attempts at trying to understand what he wanted to say^ I finally got it. In essence, what he wanted to know was, "What will become of me now that my sister is dead?" 1 reassured him that nothing had changed, that he would still be "at home" with us, in his own room, with his own caregiver, following the same schedule he had established through the years, going with us to Mass every Sunday at Santuario de San Jose in Greenhills, being driven by me to Bruno's every third Wednesday for his haircut, getting his GI cleansing twice a week, getting his bath and shave everyday, eating in restaurants occasionally ... He listened, then he grimaced, and tears rolled from the corner of his eyes. Then he smiled, relief and joy written all over his face.

The last remaining sibling, Dolores, died last December. I did not know how to tell Mamo Fred. By now, he was too weak to make the grueling trip, even airborne. We had to leave him, to bury our aunt. When 1 told him, the expected tears came, but I was prepared with my embrace. I let him cry on my chest. This death depressed him to an extent that he had to be confined three times in two months, after which he required a wheelchair for trips outside his room.Through it all, Mamo Fred has remained lucid and feisty. By November, he will have been with us for eight years. God must have a sense of humor, because the two words that have remained at Mamo Fred's command are "okay" and "lintias". The first he uses when guests have overstayed their welcome (usually after five minutes), and the second when something displeases him (usually his unfavorite viands). He has remained meticulous in his appearance, and pesters me about a haircut when it is due. If I promise to do something for him at a certain time, he does not let me forget it. His complexion has remained smooth and rosy, something most women, including myself, would like to enjoy at his age, 82.                                      

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