Fleeting
I was shocked to learn about TJ Cruz' passing. I was looking at random posts on Instagram and this one post of Filipino actor Tirso Cruz III caught my attention. I read the caption, it was a heartfelt message for his son who passed away. The name in the caption is TJ and I thought he was familiar. I clicked his account and after going through several of his past entries, I confirmed that indeed, I know the person who passed away.
TJ was a classmate in one of my classes when I took Spanish at Instituto Cervantes. That was the class described by my seatmate as, "patangusan ng ilong dito, humahabol ka nga eh". When she said that, I raised my head to see what she was talking about. From where I was seated, I could see the profiles of majority of the class, and indeed, she was right. That was also the class I attended with the most number of students. It was intimidating at first because most of them already knew each other as they were also classmates in the first level. For each of my class, I had different classmates because I kept changing my schedule, which is fine, because I got to meet a lot of people.
Anyway, as I was saying, I was surprised about this news because it wasn't even a year when we were classmates and TJ seemed fine then. He was part of the circle who already knew each other. I later learned that sometimes after class, they'd hang out somewhere. Later, during the cycle, I would eventually receive an invitation to join them (finally an invitation to join the cool kids haha!), but being the introverted me, I declined, citing work as a reason.
In our class, there was this activity where we talked about our parents and what they do. TJ spoke softly so I did not hear everything he was saying. But I noticed some of our classmates reacted so I paid attention, asked my seatmate about what he said, and was also surprised to learn that he is a son of a local celebrity. Of course, our teacher, who is a Spanish national, did not have any idea who Tirso Cruz III is so it wasn't a big deal for him. I figured maybe TJ is one of those celebrity kids who have money as well as time to spare so he's probably just studying Spanish just for fun. Or he must be travelling to Europe a lot. How great that kind of life must be, I thought.
TJ was smart, quick thinking. This based on how he'd answer the exercises and activities in our class. We got paired several times, so I know. And he seemed friendly, always smiling. He really didn't look sick then.
From what I gathered when I asked some friends, TJ had been suffering cancer for a while. It was only less than a year since our Spanish class. He was 37.
How fleeting life really is. One moment, you are making the most of your time and life in this world, and another moment, you are gone.
Rest in peace, TJ.
TJ was a classmate in one of my classes when I took Spanish at Instituto Cervantes. That was the class described by my seatmate as, "patangusan ng ilong dito, humahabol ka nga eh". When she said that, I raised my head to see what she was talking about. From where I was seated, I could see the profiles of majority of the class, and indeed, she was right. That was also the class I attended with the most number of students. It was intimidating at first because most of them already knew each other as they were also classmates in the first level. For each of my class, I had different classmates because I kept changing my schedule, which is fine, because I got to meet a lot of people.
Anyway, as I was saying, I was surprised about this news because it wasn't even a year when we were classmates and TJ seemed fine then. He was part of the circle who already knew each other. I later learned that sometimes after class, they'd hang out somewhere. Later, during the cycle, I would eventually receive an invitation to join them (finally an invitation to join the cool kids haha!), but being the introverted me, I declined, citing work as a reason.
In our class, there was this activity where we talked about our parents and what they do. TJ spoke softly so I did not hear everything he was saying. But I noticed some of our classmates reacted so I paid attention, asked my seatmate about what he said, and was also surprised to learn that he is a son of a local celebrity. Of course, our teacher, who is a Spanish national, did not have any idea who Tirso Cruz III is so it wasn't a big deal for him. I figured maybe TJ is one of those celebrity kids who have money as well as time to spare so he's probably just studying Spanish just for fun. Or he must be travelling to Europe a lot. How great that kind of life must be, I thought.
TJ was smart, quick thinking. This based on how he'd answer the exercises and activities in our class. We got paired several times, so I know. And he seemed friendly, always smiling. He really didn't look sick then.
From what I gathered when I asked some friends, TJ had been suffering cancer for a while. It was only less than a year since our Spanish class. He was 37.
How fleeting life really is. One moment, you are making the most of your time and life in this world, and another moment, you are gone.
Rest in peace, TJ.
