A
community, roughly defined, is a bunch of people who are somehow connected, sharing
among each other the same joys and achievements, sadness and struggles, and
many things-in-between.
The
Technical Services Group of the Insurance Commission is one such community.
Last July 4 to 6, we conducted our annual Strategic Planning where we squeezed
our brains dry trying to come up with strategies on how to cope with the new
national directives to streamline and shorten the turn-around time for our
systems’ processes. Sounds difficult and boring?
But
I’m not going into the details of the planning. I’m panning out to the
culmination of the activity – a simple tribute given to our retiring comrade,
Tita Ofel Castillo, Division Manager of the Statistics Division, who is
retiring at 65 years old, after serving for more than three decades at the
Insurance Commission.
Tita
Ofel is a very endearing personality – she has an easy, open smile for
everyone. Loaded with tasks related to foreign and inter-agency commitments,
one never finds her rattled, but is always calm and confident. And though
slowed down by a bothersome knee, she remains a trouper, never backing down
from action, be it another responsibility to tackle, or a pleasure trip to
enjoy
The
tribute was filled with mixed sadness and joy. Tita Ofel will surely be missed.
Her retirement means that some things will no longer be, that some things will
have to change, that new things will take the place of the old.
Indeed,
this recent Planning of the TSG is bittersweet as it might be the last not only
of Tita Ofel…for if their plans do not change….it will also be the last for Ate
Annie Lantican, Kuya Levy Baqui, and Vice Edel Bernales who all seem bent on
retiring within the coming months.
As
a community that has worked and laughed and shared our lives for years (spanning
decades for most of us), and having experienced personal and professional
hardships, prosperity, loving, fighting and sometimes bickering, together, the
line that divides sadness and happiness, hope and hollowness suddenly blurs.
But
life will go on and the community will go on, and the rest of us will carry on
what we are supposed to do until it becomes our time to hand over our responsibilities
to the younger ones. Here’s hoping that the TSG will always have that spirit
that has allowed us to work, and play, and love at the same time – the spirit
of being a family.
To Tita Ofel, congratulations on your retirement! Bring our prayers and best wishes as you begin a new chapter in your life!