of death and immortality

When I received a text message from Jel that actor Rudy Fernandez has “returned to his Maker,” I felt sad. This sadness, however, is not the variety that will send me wailing and tearing my hair and thrashing about. I’m not an avid fan of the action star, basically because action movies are not exactly my favorite, but I’m a human who realizes anew how death is that one certain destination of every living human.
Last I saw him was in the music room of his friend Jinggoy’s house. I and Jel were tutoring then, when he quietly crept in and kissed Jel. I did not expect to be kissed, of course, so I just greeted him “Good evening.” He returned the greeting and smiled. Now that music room will never be seen in the same way again, for every time I will visit Jel to study with her, the image of Rudy will inevitably conjure up in the place not so much as a frightening phantom as a lingering memory.
Rudy will always be remembered as a great actor in the Philippine movie-dom. In short, he will be immortalized like other great actors before him whom he, in more ways than one, already joined the eternal ranks of. Hopefully, all of us get to follow suit; I mean, not in our sudden demise—to quote Pangga, “Together in life and death, pero huwag muna ngayon.” I mean to hope that everyone becomes immortal in one’s own little way—through literature, through good deeds, through Godliness—so that one’s fleeting life will outrun its own course.