By Herman M. Lagon
Sometimes it comes quietly — not with announcements or goodbyes, but with the ordinary weight of a moment. A daughter comes home unexpectedly two weeks before Christmas, sits across the table as herself, and you realize the child you once held no longer needs holding — just as she prepares to leave again, two days after the holidays, to return to work abroad. That was how this season opened (and will close) for me when Psyche Mae came home from the US, carrying with her not just luggage, but a life fully her own.
Being with her felt familiar and new at the same time. In the days after her arrival, we shared meals, stories, songs, laughter that did not try to prove anything. Somewhere between those small moments, I found myself opening an old Palanca letter I once wrote when she was still a 16-year-old Atenean in a yearly socio-spiritual retreat — younger, fragile and smaller than the world she now moves through with confidence. I did not read it this time as a writer, as a teacher or even as a then doting father. I read it as someone who had already let go once, and was learning how to do it again.
The first line stopped me: “I never expected you to be born so early.” I could feel the younger version of myself in that sentence — unsteady, overwhelmed, already in love. I had no idea then how often love would ask me to choose courage over control, trust over fear. Fifteen years ago, I believed almost completely that sacrifice alone would be enough. I did not yet know that love would later require restraint, humility and the discipline of stepping back.
There were details in that letter I had forgotten. “Your high-pitch singing … and cute-sleeping always make me smile.” The list went on — forced embraces, classy laughter, excellent writing, graceful dancing, even chess played with quiet wit. Ordinary things, written without thinking they would last. But those are the moments that stay. Not the milestones, not the medals — just the small ways a child takes up space in your life without asking permission.
One line still humbles me: “You might have not known it but you have inspired me to keep going when I felt like giving up.” I once thought I was the one doing the shaping. Time gently corrected that assumption. Long before you had language for it, you steadied me. Long before you understood the weight of adult life, you gave me reason to keep showing up. Even now, you and your sister, Parvane Mae, still do — just without needing me to lead the way.
Another passage reads differently with time: “Some days I wish I could hold you and keep you from the world … but that would also keep you from many joys and life’s learning.” When I wrote that, it sounded hopeful, almost poetic. Living it was harder. Letting go turned out not to be a single brave moment, but a series of quiet decisions — choosing not to interfere, not to rescue, not to impose fear where trust was needed.
The letter also carried a comparison that stayed with me: “Like Marlin, you are my Nemo … that I must let go soon.” At the time, I smiled at the Walt Disney metaphor. Now I understand it more fully. Parenting was never about holding on tightly; it was about learning when to release without abandoning, when to guide without steering, and when to watch from a distance without disappearing.
There was apology in that letter too — “for the tantrums, the scolding, the demands, the sour faces, the unfair comparisons, the seeming show of inattention.” Reading that now, I realized how much parenting is done in hindsight. You understand your missteps only after your child no longer needs explanations. And yet, children carry forward not our perfection, but our effort. Not our consistency, but our sincerity. Not our certainty, but our willingness to grow.
I also wrote in the said Palanca letter, “I do not regret being tough to you though.” That line unsettled me now. Not because it was wrong, but because toughness only matters when it is anchored in care. Looking at you, (Teacher) Psyche, today — teaching, listening, shaping other people’s children with patience and structure — I see how love, even when imperfect, can still become formative when it is grounded in presence and honesty.
What moves me most, rereading that one-page Palanca, is what it did not try to demand of you. There were no timelines, no measures of success, no instructions on who you should become. Only an invitation to explore, to discover, to live widely and deeply. Watching you now, after all the Latin honors and letters after your name, I see how quietly those freedoms took root, and how they grew without needing my supervision.
As Christmas passes and you prepare to return to your life across the ocean at past 30 with your kind hubby Vincent, I metaphorically fold the almost 15-year-old Palanca letter back where it belongs. It no longer feels like something written for a child, or a teenager. It feels like a reminder written for me — that love does not tighten its grip with time. It learns how to stay present even as proximity grows far and wide.
If you ever read this before taking a step on the plane, dear Psyche Mae, know this simply: I see who you have become. With God’s grace, I trust how you got there. And wherever you go next, you carry more with you than you realize — not as expectation, but as quiet confidence, steady purpose and a life fully, firmly and fiercely your own.
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Doc H fondly describes himself as a “student of and for life” who, like many others, aspires to a life-giving and why-driven world grounded in social justice and the pursuit of happiness. His views do not necessarily reflect those of the institutions he is employed or connected./WDJ