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VITA BREVIS
It's interesting how much we forget is important when we're drawn in to the fast pace of urban living.
For 18 of my 23 years, I have never failed to go to my parents' home province for the annual family reunion with the innumerable cousins, aunts, uncles, and my venerable great grandaunt (grandparents on both sides having passed away before I was born). For the last 5 years, I did. Given everything I've remembered and reexperienced these past few days, I will always regret those 5 years being away from 'home'.
I was born in the city, part of the only family raised in the capital, the rest of my patriarchal and matriarchal 'clans' firmly rooted in one of the provinces an hour away by plane. Growing up, however, I never felt the distance. My childhood is rife with memories of spending long summer days playing with my cousins at my grandfather's house near the sea, crossing the breadth of it to the next island during low tide under a full moon while gathering fish literally just lying there in a few inches of seawater, being taught the difference between all sorts of corals, shells, and all the inmates of marine life...and going rowing in a little boat at four in the morning watching the sun rise while the sea revels in its calm.
I tell myself most of the time that I'm a 'landlubber', not really fond of the constantly changing moods of the sea. But of course I realize how much of a lie that is the moment I find myself back at the heart of it. :) The only thing I will accept as approximating paradise is the sheer serenity of the nearly still waters of the open sea at sunrise, the wind crisply cold, the world perfectly at peace...
The last five years I had always managed to get out of these family reunions because of academic work or finals papers, or debate tournaments (!), or employment (I only work on projects I'm passionate about, although the remuneration has been more than satisfactory...hehehe.) And while my father would be severely disappointed but silently understand, my mother would never cease to tell me, down to the very last minute that she's leaving, how much both I and my relatives will be missing my absence in a way I wouldn't understand then. I always thought Dad understood because of the similarities in our work ethics, and Mum tended to be a bit 'sentimental'. This year when my schedule cleared to permit me to go, I realized how much foresight my mother had.
We visited both my patriarchal and matriarchal grandparents' graves on All Saints' Day. I was their youngest grandchild, and only my maternal grandmother saw me born a month before she passed away. My mother tells me I inherited much of my 'gifts' for eloquence and keen insight into human nature from her. I don't doubt it. All my life, I'd always felt my grandmother's benign presence. I was four when I dreamt of a kind old lady who kissed my shoulder, weeping that I was hurt. I woke up and found myself on the floor, having fallen off the bed. (I had such a tendency for falling off the bed that my father used to look in on me periodically, knowing the exact time when I'd fall off. Hahaha...) When I woke up that morning there was a mark on my left shoulder, where I dreamt the lady had kissed me. It wasn't a bruise, and the dermatologist told me later on that it was a birthmark and it must've been there all along and we just didn't notice. But my parents knew better. I saw a picture of my grandmother later on and realized that the lady in my dream was her. Since that time she has always been present in my dreams in momentous events in my life, sad and happy --- when both my parents nearly died in a tragic assassination attempt, when I was on the verge of dying from illness at 14 and the doctors were despairing, when I graduated with the highest honors, sundry birthdays, traveling, etc. My grandmother kept that feeling of 'home' alive in me even when I couldn't make it back these five years.
This year's reunion was typically awash with food, music, laughter, and prayers. My great grandaunt, who never married, is the holiest person I know. She is 90 years old and still walks the three kilometers to the village church every day to hear Mass and attend novenas (despite our attempts to drive her over there...), strong and wise with a wisdom of a thousand years. She was visibly affected to see her 'prodigal' great grandniece come home. I was just as moved to see her, having usually accompanied her as a child to church early in the mornings...
I have four cousins recently married, several now with toddlers taking our places in the family. :) Being the youngest child in our generation, I was often teased, badgered, and harangued by my two mischievous siblings in conspiracy with the rest of our cousins. I was amazed to see how much things had changed, and how much things didn't. Now I still get teased, badgered, and harangued, but only to a lesser degree since my nephews and nieces like to defend their favorite aunt from, as my nephew likes to lisp, "thoth mean people". Hahaha... How ironic that a lawyer (or one soon to be one, I pray...) would only be defended by children!
It's a slow, simple, and charmed existence in that side of the world. It's easier to hold someone to his or her word. To make contracts with a handshake on the basis of sheer trust, having known each other's pedigree to the 1800s. :) To prepare meals with ingredients the freshness and flavor MNCs can never dare to even try to supply. To let sun, sand, sea, wind, and waves overwhelm you...and wonder why all those all-nighters in law school seemed so terribly important back then. To feel love abound with the warmth and ties of a childhood long forgotten...and remember what it is that I work so hard for.
I'm back, but I'm glad I made it home.