One at One Tepeyac and Other Dennises

A Saturday at One Tepeyac, a good view of Banahaw, where I learned (among many other things) that I'm going to write forever, that a particular yellow big bird considers me a big hairy elephant with cutting wisdom, and that oysters in onions will make my day. We celebrated the birthday of a 73-year old priest who had strength, disposition, and hair to belie the fact of his age. Genes, I figure, with nothing much else to go on. His mother will celebrate her hundredth within the year.

I also learned of a dead Dennis, a good man with a wife, two kids, and a ready smile. He recently got promoted to assistant manager at a bank and was in charge of counting the money, among other things. He was a cordial man, made the bank feel as much like home as possible, and played a good round of tennis. He died Thursday because of bacterial pneumonia. It was sudden, not much struggle, save for his family who must contend with the fact the he died because, unlike our readiness for viral pneumonia, we still had nothing against the bacterial strain. He would be a vegetable even if he survived, so they opted not to hook him into life support.

Dennis died Thursday last week, he was thirty-five, and the best guess was that he got the bacteria from the money he counted.

I learned that another Dennis lay in the same hospital because of the same strain. Last week too, his family faced a decision. They chose life support.