By PABLO A. TARIMAN
ONE of the few remaining living icons of Philippine journalism turned 91 last July 19 and she spent it with close friends and relatives who are still in awe of the durable and colorful life she has led.
Carmen Guerrero Nakpil is appreciative of the respect and recognition but she is at once embarrassed by dinner speeches summing up — what she was and still is – in the field of Philippine history and journalism.
Indeed, she is a first-rate journalist and columnist of the pre-martial law Manila Times and Manila Chronicle, among other publications.
She is author of ten books on history and related topics and at some phases of her life, she was public servant at the Philippine Historical Commission and then later, at the Technology Resource Center.
Born in 1922 to a distinguished Ermita family famous for its painters and poets as well as scientists and doctors, Mrs. Nakpil is herself a living icon of history.
Her first marriage in 1942 was to an Ateneo graduate named Lt. Ismael Cruz who is a grandson of Maria Rizal, the sister of Jose Rizal. Her second marriage in 1950 was with architect and city planner Angel Nakpil who is the cousin of composer and patriot Juan Nakpil, son of Gregoria de Jesus, formerly married to Andres Bonifacio.
From her Guerrero side, she is the granddaughter of the country’s first licensed pharmacist, Leon Ma. Guerrero, who is the younger brother of painter Lorenzo Guerrero who was mentor to Juan Luna. She is grandniece of Jose Mossesgeld Santiago-Font who is the first Filipino opera singer to invade La Scala di Milan.
As though this were not enough, Mrs. Nakpil happens to be the granddaughter of Gabriel Beato Francisco who was a distinguished Tagalog writer, journalist, novelist and playwright.
Colorful chapters of 91 years of her life are summed in her autobiographical trilogy, “Myself, Elsewhere” (2006), “Legends & Adventures,” (2007) and “Exeunt” (2009).
Reading Mrs. Nakpil’s life is by itself a living lesson on history.
In the first part of her trilogy, “Myself, Elsewhere,” she paints a breath-taking recollection of pre-war Ermita beach where fishing boats deposited and disposed of the day’s catch and where people dropped everything to observe the 6 p.m. Oracion when the angelus was prayed.
That pre-war idyll was the exact opposite of her early adult life starting 1942 when she saw Japanese soldiers taking over Ermita. Her brother Leoni became prisoners of war and so was her would-be groom, Ismail Cruz.
At age 20 on August 29, 1942, Mrs. Nakpil married her prisoner-of-war bridegroom she fondly calls Toto and started living with her in-laws in Gen. Luna St. in Paco, Manila.. In that household was her husband’s famous grandmother, Lola Maria Rizal, favorite sister of Jose Rizal.
The marital bliss was short-lived. Less than three years after that marriage, she lost everything in that war: her first husband, her home and all kinds of resources except her parents and her brothers who had become destitute.
She was a widow with two children to raise at age 22.
Mrs. Nakpil’s second book in the trilogy, “Legends & Adventures,” focused on her post-World War II life as war widow, reporter, editorial columnist and Marcos official. Here she sums up another life as mother of the country’s first Miss International, Gemma Guererro Cruz and the rise and fall of Marcos, among others. Casually, she tarried on the International Cancer Ball where she danced with Hollywood actor Gregory Peck at the Manila Hilton.
With her last book “Exeunt,” Mrs. Nakpil confronts the inevitable : “ “I have come to the conclusion that old age is really just a form of slow death. That’s probably why people say that’ the good die young’. They die swiftly, in their prime. The other kind, ‘the poor sinners’ like me, hang on, unaware that the series of minute changes, difficulties, disappearances that occur with increasing regularity, a tooth missing, a bone breaking, a sudden ache, a mysterious weakening are really part of the inevitable final dissolution.”
But not before she takes pride in her grandsons who represent the new generation.
At age 91, Mrs. Nakpil likes to call herself the condo-dweller in First World Makati.
She is all alone most of the time waiting for what she said fellow Catholics loved to invoke as “the hour of our death.”
In this last phase of her life, Mrs. Nakpil admits she has finally understood many things, both small and huge, fripperies and profundities.
She reflects: “We Filipinos draw our endless patience, our good nature and our trust in God’s master plan from a simple unshakable faith.”
She remembers quoting lines from St. Theresa of Avila: “Nada te turbe. Nada te espante. Let nothing disturb or frighten you. Everything passes. God never changes. Solo dios Basta. God alone suffices. No longer restless or fractured, rid at last of all strange gods, this very old heart withdraws into peace.”