Earning It

 Author’s Note

This reflection takes a quieter turn from the usual trail. I often write about food, streets, and the comfort of memory. But this one came after watching Saving Private Ryan (1998) for the first time. I found myself not only reflecting on war, but on the weight of history, sacrifice, and the responsibility of the living.

Please read it slowly. I hope it moves you the way it moved me.

(And who knows… I might start a little series of movie reflections that break and remake me when I’m not out wandering. Stay tuned.)

 

“Earn this,” hits harder when you realize it’s not just Captain Miller’s dying words to a single man. It’s a call to all of us who are alive because others gave their lives for us to be. Private Ryan isn’t just a man from Iowa. He’s a collective, a symbol. He’s every survivor who asked, “Why me?”—and his story echoed across oceans, across time, and into our own history. He is every Filipino today who enjoys voting rights, access to education, safety, and dignity because someone—many someones—bled for it.

 

Steven Spielberg knew what he was doing, of course. With Janusz Kamiński behind the camera, the opening scene alone—those 30 minutes of chaos on Omaha Beach—felt less like a film and more like a memory inherited. The grime, the blur, the shaking frame, the impossible silence that follows it. It wasn’t cinematic, it was visceral. Spielberg didn’t just direct a war movie. He peeled the skin off war and made us look.

 

As I reflect, I remember these words by President Quezon, “[Nuestro] pasado está consagrado por los sacrificios de nuestros mártires y soldados.” The Katipuneros who never got to see the Philippines free. The comfort women who were silenced. The journalists, labor leaders, farmers, and students who disappeared during Martial Law. The countless unnamed heroes in every war, revolt, or protest. They all whispered the same plea: Earn this.

 

And what a responsibility it is. Not to live a perfect life, but one that is honest, kind, and grounded in truth. A life that resists apathy. A life that remembers.

 

It’s the voice of the dying speaking to the living—not out of bitterness, but out of hope. “Earn this,” isn’t meant to glorify sacrifice for its own sake. It’s a reminder that death should not be romanticized, but justified. The Katipuneros, the comfort women, the journalists, labor leaders, farmers, and students—if they gave their lives for a cause, the only way to make sense of that loss is to live in a way that honors it.

 

It wasn’t just a message for one man. It was a message meant to travel forward in time. To us. To you. To me. Isang panawagan—hindi para sumunod nang bulag, kundi para mabuhay nang may layunin. Para sa bayan. Para sa kapwa. Para sa sarili.

 

And maybe, the greatest act of remembrance is to wake up each day and ask: am I earning it?