Last year, while I was on an audit fieldwork in Alabang, I met a very nice, refined old lady. To this day, the conversation I had with her is still the best I have had with a stranger.
It was lunch, I was alone waiting for my food to be served. She just finished placing her order at the counter and was looking for a vacant seat but the place was packed. She noticed I was with no one so she politely asked if she can sit with me on my table, to which I politely agreed. We were silent for the first few minutes but she finally broke it by asking if I worked in the area, to which I responded not really but that I’m an auditor on a fieldwork in one of our audit clients. I asked what she was doing in the area and she said she lives nearby but she had to bring her car to Ford for a maintenance check.
We exchanged stories over lunch. Stories about my life and her life, my family and hers. She was amazed to find out that I’m a UP cum laude graduate, a CPA at 22 and ranked 20th in the boards. I learned that she has three children, two are married and her youngest son is single, 27 at the time, a computer science graduate from La Salle but studied culinary as well because he loves cooking, or baking but that’s not important. She went on to say “Gwapo yung anak ko. O ayan ha binibida ko na sa’yo. I really wish you two could meet“, to which I just politely smiled. I know for sure that what she said about her son was true not just because she is his mother but that she herself was a beautiful woman. The kind that aged gracefully.
I have always felt insecure about how I look. I guess because I do not fit with the Filipino standard of beauty. But when she told me that she decided to sit with me for lunch because I looked very smart and beautiful, it made me realize I give myself too little credit. And that I am the kind of woman mothers want their sons to marry.
When we finished, I walked her to Ford, she insisted that I take her number and that I message her. I sent her a text that night telling her how lovely it was to meet her. She replied by saying that I was such a nice young woman and a great dining companion too and how she wished her son could meet me. I told her I hope we can meet again, she said maybe we will, it’s a small world after all. That never happened of course but hey it’s a small world.