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| With his family |
Life has always been a challenge to every living soul, not because we are meant to suffer but because it is required of us as sons and daughters of a loving Heavenly Father. We came to earth to be tried and tested to prove our worth in the context of God’s eternal plan of happiness. Jesus Christ, the only sinless man who ever lived on earth, suffered in excruciating agony in the garden of Gethsemane and carried His cross up the hill at Calvary and there crucified. We also are subjected to the pains of our own personal Gethsemane and are each to carry the cross to our personal Calvary's hill.
The multiplicity of alluring temptations which Satan has lodged to counter our innate desires to do good so filled the borders around our personal life that we seemed to have nowhere else to run but to submit to one or the other of his glamorous invitations. The enticement to a vice or inducement to moral digression is offered by him who is in control of all evils of the earth, only for his supposed victims to experiment and try. But as one takes the bait, he adds greasing to the slides for one to freely skid into the lake of dependence. Then he holds his sure victim with a grip that is very difficult to break. The vice then which started with only a sip of enjoyment in friendly persuasions eventually becomes a cruel taskmaster, a Goliath to face in daily battle.
The multiplicity of alluring temptations which Satan has lodged to counter our innate desires to do good so filled the borders around our personal life that we seemed to have nowhere else to run but to submit to one or the other of his glamorous invitations. The enticement to a vice or inducement to moral digression is offered by him who is in control of all evils of the earth, only for his supposed victims to experiment and try. But as one takes the bait, he adds greasing to the slides for one to freely skid into the lake of dependence. Then he holds his sure victim with a grip that is very difficult to break. The vice then which started with only a sip of enjoyment in friendly persuasions eventually becomes a cruel taskmaster, a Goliath to face in daily battle.
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| With daughters |
Such was the case of my good friend and neighbour of many years, Martino R. Ensomo. I knew him when I was young in government service. The government agencies we worked for were interrelated in functions. Then we became close neighbours in the same government subdivision. We also served both in the General PTA when our children were still students at the Surigao del Norte National High School. I knew him to be a good man, except that I observed him to have a vice very common to many---drunkenness. Yet in many of our meetings where wine and liquor are a permanent component of the menu, I observed him to be such a sober man even when drunken, much different from any of the rest who are in the common drinking sprees. His voice remained soft even in harsh discussions. His emotional temperance was also observed in his dealings with his family. As I compared him with many of my friends and neighbours who are in the same vicious attachments to hard drinks, I considered him an uncommon husband, father and neighbour.
Although I am two years younger than he was, we retired just a few months interval. Since then we often meet around the neighbourhood. I always observed him to be such a homely man. He is very concerned of his family’s welfare and affectionate to his wife and children. I found his alcoholism totally different from what I learned about those who are addicted to what is popularly known as “the genie on the bottle”---alcohol, which is described as pervasive and destructive of the victim and his family. I sensed that he was not meant for such a vicious habit and I felt he regretted that he ever started it. Except perhaps for his craving of the substance, he was totally aware that he has to live ever strong as to never inflict upon his children, especially his only son, the overpowering force that had put him in bondage. In his struggle to resolve his dependence he submitted to the desire of his family for therapy and treatment. It was a long battle and he returned carrying temporary relief. However, his physical system perhaps had long been inhabited by such a harmful substance that had become so difficult to emit despite long medication.
Although I am two years younger than he was, we retired just a few months interval. Since then we often meet around the neighbourhood. I always observed him to be such a homely man. He is very concerned of his family’s welfare and affectionate to his wife and children. I found his alcoholism totally different from what I learned about those who are addicted to what is popularly known as “the genie on the bottle”---alcohol, which is described as pervasive and destructive of the victim and his family. I sensed that he was not meant for such a vicious habit and I felt he regretted that he ever started it. Except perhaps for his craving of the substance, he was totally aware that he has to live ever strong as to never inflict upon his children, especially his only son, the overpowering force that had put him in bondage. In his struggle to resolve his dependence he submitted to the desire of his family for therapy and treatment. It was a long battle and he returned carrying temporary relief. However, his physical system perhaps had long been inhabited by such a harmful substance that had become so difficult to emit despite long medication.
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| With his wife and eldest daughter |
I consider his life as a lesson for everybody who is struggling to battle against the impulse and oftentimes compulsive temptation to drinking hard liquor. It was a Goliath that my good friend and neighbour had battled for years. We need to know that no matter how innately good a man is and how righteous his plans maybe, he can be trapped and be in bondage to the devil’s torment. These mammoth of alluring baits which are destructive to our body and spirits are within our daily view, which we need to be warned about. They are attractively advertised in giant television networks and produced by giant companies. I refer to cigarette, liquor and beer. They are meant to destroy and enslave people. There is an even more dangerous monster that is silently walking the streets and entering school campuses and clandestinely creeping into bars hungering for its prey. It is a multi-billion peso trade of Shabu drugs---methamphetamine---almost encompassing our country. It is a drug that can result to chronic addiction, violent behaviour, functional and molecular changes in the brain, and several other symptoms. Among its most desired victims are our innocent youth---the hope of the fatherland--- who are most vulnerable and easily lured into the experimentation of the pleasurable effects of the drug. The monsters behind these evils are tough and very clever that their agents and pushers can even penetrate inside heavily guarded prisons. Their covert intentions are to enrich themselves and destroy their victims. It is high time that we be aware for its venom might spread into the very doors of our homes and our families might be subjected to the devil’s ever tempting carrot.
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| His only son |
I have my highest respect for my very good friend and neighbour Martino R. Ensomo for having fought his personal Goliath---a dependence on alcohol, without necessarily affecting the welfare of his family. I had seen his highest respect and greatest love for his wife. I had observed how he loved his children and how he fought for their educational battle even challenging the school’s academic rankings during high school. I am a witness of how his wife and children respected and loved him despite his enduring weakness. In view in our neighbourhood is a humble but beautiful house he and his wife built for the family---a monument to his accomplishment as a good provider. With his earnest desire to provide comfort for his family, he bought for them a second hand car. His children graduated with honors in high school; two of them earned college degrees from a premiere university---the University of the Philippines. His eldest daughter is a management graduate and his second daughter is a Certified Public Accountant. His only son, the last born, graduated from the Cebu Institute of Technology and is a licensed Chemical Engineer. The character traits of his children are living witnesses that they are rightfully raised and reared. The academic and professional accomplishments of his children will ever remain as an undying symbol of his good parenting in partnership with his beloved wife.
As ageing weakens the body, complications took its tool. On October 25, 2015, at age 65, he was finally summoned to leave this frail existence. At his passing I heard negative comments about him, particularly about his dependence to a devil’s destructive tools. However, in my long association with him as a friend and neighbour, I will always remember and honor him as an uncommon man who fought his battle against a Goliath of adversity in his personal life while at the same time protecting his family from its destructive influence. I have my thoughts written in reverence of him as an uncommon husband and father; a worthy exemplar to emulate. I and my wife will miss that tender smile which he usually exhibited as we passed by their home. Farewell my dear friend Martin, farewell.
