When I look back over my so-called life, I am reminded of times when I was a complete biatch. Yes, the old woman who raised me taught me a lot, such as how the snooty feeling-superior Spanish senyoritas comported themselves in the years when Spain still controlled the Philippines. She taught me pride. She taught me never to bend, to keep a stiff upper lip, to never tell other people how I felt. She taught me to never associate with the "lower classes," which she called "bakeros", "galoots" and "yokels." She taught me to stay away from boys and later from men, because they were after only one thing, and that was my complete degradation.

But I'm only human.

She was mad as hell when she first found out about HH2B. She called him the Devil's Spawn, and would have forcibly removed me back home if she could. He was all the things she didn't want in my life... somebody new to love, someone from the "lower classes", someone who would "take advantage" of me.

But HH2B, even when he acted like a jerk (and I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt for youth), taught me a lot of things just by being himself, his parents' son, his sisters' brother.

He taught me that many of the barriers and gaps we perceive between people are artificial, erected by ourselves. He taught me that underneath all the social trappings, all the titles or lack thereof, people are essentially similar. We all love and hate, fear and hope, elate and despair. Too, we can all be good and bad, polite and rude, angelic and complete jackasses by turns, and that is all too much a part of being human.

Even if he were to be out of my life completely, he is the reason why I could never go back to being the spoiled snooty little bitch I once was. Because I would remember that once upon a time, he was in my life, and taught me to be a little more tolerant, a little more forgiving, a little more understanding.

Were it not for his baby sister, I would not have been as understanding and protective of special children as I would be if I personally cared about one. And I would not have had her in my life or learned to love her had she not been her brother's sister. Had I not seen how much her brother cared about her, or the almost desperate affection he had for her, had I not known all too well how powerless he felt to change what life had dealt her.

Sometimes when I look at him I feel a bit of that helplessness. I can't do anything about it. I can't do anything that would make him feel a little less torn up, except leave him alone and hope that he works everything out for himself. Even when I want to hug him, I can't, because it would just make him all the more determined to stay away. The only thing I can do is be as patient as if I wanted a butterfly to alight on my hand... to sit still and be quiet, and wait for him to come to me.

Sometimes I think to myself: Is that all? Is that why he was put in your life, to open your eyes and make you feel more for others? Is that all the reason he's here now? And that thought is scary, because that would mean that now that I've realized the lessons he's taught me, he'll be gone from my life, his purpose finished. And that I would, somehow, have to live with that reality if that would happen, whether or not I have prepared myself for it.