On Writing

I found these while looking for my SSS card and suddenly a flood of memories came rushing in.


Sama-Samang News was a monthly publication of Sama-Sama Together, what we call my generation back in the 1980's. The newsletter was published from March to June 1988 and March to July 1990. I was the editor-in-chief, my cousin from Marikina was second in command. At that time, I used the Newsmaster publishing software on a 5.25 inch floppy disk and printed copies using a dot matrix printer. Distribution was by hand locally and by snail mail for international subscribers. Yes, we did charge a subscription fee.

In grade school, I never won honors for writing. That was the turf of S1 and the cousin from Marikina. My happiness then was playing chess and dama with the boys. The teachers would say "Why can't you be like your sister and cousin?" They were best in conduct too.

I transferred schools in high school because of location issues as we moved house too. A teacher called me an underachiever and instead of feeling bad, I thought that it was a compliment. After all, she seemed to be saying that I have a lot of potential. That didn't push me any harder. I was happy to know that I could be better. I remember a time I excelled in class. We were asked to pick by lot topics we would extemporaneously speak on. I got "Should Imelda Marcos run for president?" My speech was adjudged best in class.

In college, except for dressing up as a policeman in a Spanish class and Maria Clara in our group's presentation Museum of Love for a Speech class, I never considered writing other than what was required to pass the subject. My paper in ecology was about how butterflies choose their mates. In the summers, I published the family newsletter Sama-Samang News.

While in med school, save for my internship years where I kept a journal, I never wrote anything other than clinical abstracts and discharge summaries.

After the medical boards, I wrote an essay about med school with the byline Em Dy intending to submit it to PDI's Young Blood. I was encouraged by S2's writing. Her articles appeared in page 6 of the Inquirer, this was and remains to be a prime spot. I never submitted the article.

Except for my research papers on a rare cancer, heart attack and urinary tract infection, I never wrote articles during residency. I discovered my writing in 2000 (or was it 2001?) when I was tapped by a mentor to represent the hospital in the convention newsletter editorial board as one of its pool of writers. That I did until 2003, my first year of practice. In between, I wrote for a short-lived institute newsletter and for the organization's newsletter until 4 years back when I begged off as I'd lost interest writing about medical things. When before I could write an article in a jiffy, way, way before it was due, towards the end of my stint I had to push myself to beat the deadline. I became part of the organization's journal instead, editing scientific articles. In the last 8 years, I've compiled research papers, worked on souvenir programs, a handbook and a coffee table book.

But now I'm writing again, daily even, as what I promised myself I'd do when I started this blog. And now, the words flow continuously, one after the other. This blog is about finding the groove back.

I know that I would look back on this blog in a few years and again, a flood of memories would come rushing in as they did yesterday and as I write this.

writing, speaking, blog