Our Family’s Special Psalm-One
by Oliver Carlos
The bunso or youngest child in every family is always the most special one. That child would be the family’s apple-of-the-eye and cutest sibling. Because the bunso is the last one to be born, the last baby of the family, he would have the greatest number of fans adoring him, compared to his older siblings. In our family, that one is Jesus Jr. We call him Jay-R. When he was born on May 3, 1979, everybody was crazy over him, adoring his cuteness by pinching his cheeks and deltoids.
Growing up, he also had a lot of cute and funny stories. Here are my top 3 favorite stories about Jay-R. I arranged it in a countdown fashion:
Number 3: When Jay-R was around 2 or 3 years old, we brought him to the hospital for a minor procedure or “surgery.” He innocently picked up the little white balls from a grass called mutha (Cyperus rotundus) and stuffed it in his nose. I think these balls were flowers. They’re smaller than peas. One of them got stuck very deep in his nostrils. We didn’t know that for several days. When the doctor took it out, he said that the grass ball had sprouted some roots already.
Number 2: When Jay-R was around 3 or 4 years old, he loved watching television. Another thing about him is that he didn’t like it when he gets scolded. One day, after getting scolded, he put up a handful of his clothes in a plastic bag. He also took a long stick around 1 meter long, then hanged the plastic bag on one end of the stick. Jay-R then walked away from home carrying the stick with plastic bag on his shoulder. He actually copied Nino Mulach in one of his movies. I found him around 200 meters away from our gate and carried him back home.
Number 1: Jay-R loved copying his big brother. One day when he was around 4 years old, I made a show by eating raw talinum leaves from my cousin’s garden. I didn’t know that what I ate was just a talinum look-a-like. It was actually a poisonous plant. Good thing I was given first aid right away. I didn’t know Jay-R was observing me. At our garden, he just plucked out at random a leaf and chewed it like what I did.
What Jay-R chewed was actually a dumb cane (Dieffenbachia seguine), it’s another poisonous plant. It makes people lose their speech, they become mute or dumb. Everybody went crazy when they saw Jay-R chewing the dumb cane leaf. I prayed so hard for my brother. I didn’t want him to grow up with a speech defect. That’s the first time I prayed so hard. Thank God, the plant didn’t affect my brother’s speech. It didn’t make him dumb.
My brother grew up to be a very smart man. He became a math genius. He finished his engineering degree from Mapua in a record 4 ½ years instead of 5 years (this was when Mapua was still on a semester calendar). His first job was at Smart, and he was so smart that a leading American telecom company took him in the late 2000s. Now he’s living comfortably in the US with his wife and 4 adorable kids.
Jay-R has matured by leaps and bounds both physically and spiritually. He’s a very diligent student of the Bible. He posts Bible verses every day on social media and he leads a Bible study group composed of Filipino friends and co-workers in California. Since it’s online mode, my parents regularly attend Jay-R’s Bible study group. He’s the epitome of the Psalm 1 man:
“Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked or stand in the way that sinners take or sit in the company of mockers, but whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and who meditates on his law day and night.
That person is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither — whatever they do prospers.” (Psalm 1:1–3, NIV)
To my brother Jay-R, happy birthday! God bless you more and more in every way!
