Violeta “Volet” Luna last week celebrated her 94th orbit around the sun, or more than 34,000 days in this charmed place we call Earth. 

For nearly 11,000 of those days, or 30 years, she’s been my upbeat mother-in-law, always glad to receive visitors, greeting everyone with a dimpled smile. Her kids, all of them senior citizens except the youngest (my wife), recently threw her a party where 150 of her closest friends and relatives came, many of them thematically attired like the rural folks in Amorsolo paintings. 

As the center of attention from noon until dark, this nonagenarian joked around with nearly everyone, remembered their names and even gave a speech near the end with little trace of exhaustion. 

It’s a pretty amazing feat, having this kind of mental acuity and energy at 94, living long enough to see eight great grandchildren with another coming soon. 

I can almost see the “sanaol” thought bubbles in my readers. Very rare is this kind of longevity, so best not to be too hopeful. Less than two percent of us will reach that age. 

But just as important as life span is “health span,” the length of time in your life when your mental faculties are generally intact, you’re mobile and not run down by illness. Mommy Volet’s health span has been the same as her life span. That’s the real golden age. 

While she’s still a rarity, the median age worldwide has been rising. There are more old people in the Philippines than ever before. The challenge has always been to stay healthy and alert even as one ages. 

Mommy Volet’s longevity and health span have been the subject of speculation by loved ones hoping for a similar jackpot. Good genes, of course, are just the luck of life’s lottery. But we’re also aware of other important factors influenced by choice. While she hasn’t been picky with her food, she’s had access to fresh and healthy food much of her life. It’s also helped greatly that as a shrewd businesswoman in her younger years, she’s enabled herself to live comfortably in her old age. 

Then there’s family and community. Many by now have heard of “blue zones,” places in the world where people routinely live to their 90s and beyond. This term was popularized by the Netflix series “Live to a Hundred: Secrets of the Blue Zones.” The places identified as blue zones were mostly rural, where the social networks are traditional and the pace of life is slow. 

Mommy Violeta lives in the center of Lipa, a traffic-snarled city one wouldn’t consider a blue zone. 

But what she’s done is create her own mini blue zone, where her home is a hub of mahjong-playing amigas who fill her living room with laughter and the euphonious clicking of tiles. 

Even in the midst of a mahjong session, she’ll leave her amigas when a family member drops by even for an unannounced visit, finding a separate space to update each other on the latest personal or family news. In the last few years, I’ve spoken to her often about her family’s history, aware that the memory of past generations could soon vanish. In her 90s, that hasn’t happened. 

She’s had numerous such visits from family members and friends throughout most of her life, since many of them live nearby. Mommy Volet still lives in the house where she grew up. Her family’s roots in Batangas are as deep as any other, and perhaps matched by the illustrious Luna clan of her late husband Benjamin who lived to the age of 95, another walking master class on how to age with grace, still teasing his grandchildren about their love lives until the end. 

I don’t think it’s a coincidence that they both became nonagenarians with remarkable health spans, their memories crisp into their 90s. Their clans are large and tightly knit, the reunions and meetups frequent, the camaraderie often boisterous. 

At her 94th birthday bash last Saturday, Mommy Volet was ribbed for hiding when Benjamin came to ask her parents for her hand, nearly 75 years ago. 

Their paths may have unknowingly crossed much earlier. They both on separate occasions told me stories about fleeing Lipa to Taal Volcano as adolescents during World War 2. They had not yet met each other. An active volcano, Taal nevertheless sheltered them and enabled many other Batangueños to survive a rampaging Japanese army. 

The same volcano was the sentimental backdrop for Mommy Volet’s party on the shores of Taal Lake. Most see it today as a postcard-pretty disaster waiting to happen, as it did just five years ago. 

Few people are left who remember it clearly as a wartime refuge that allowed them to live and say thanks for a long life well lived.