20050619
dad's day
today was a really good father's day. it was spectacularly sunny and i spent it with friends. but in a nutshell: i miss my dad. i had another what if my dad were here moments earlier. it was good. i will always wonder that. but the good thing's that whenever i think that way, i know something's seriously up. even when he was alive, i never thought to ask that often for his opinion, although when he would tell stories, i would perk up and absorb every word he said. he told stories so vividly that i could see them in my head - how extremely flooded were the ricefields in the heavy storms that his brother who liked to swin could swim in it. later, he said, when the storm passed, they'd hurry into the ricefields to catch fish brought in by the sea.
his story wasn't just animated, it was fantastic - no storm could bring in the sea, and yummy fish along with it. later, i'd read about an exact, similar incident written by a writer my dad's age had he not died. and then i believed his fish in the ricefields story. only it was too late, because when he told it, i thought it was the ravings of a sick, old man. now, it was too late for him.
but i like to think that it's not yet too late for me. i can still complete tasks he told me do a long time ago, scenes that remain crystal clear in my head. i understand most of it now.
but i still miss my dad. i think anyone who's ever lost a father to illness or other pathways to the eternal will always miss their dads. it doesn't beat him being around.
he used to drive all of us to the philippine long distance telephone office near the quezon circle, so we can spend some time talking to our mom. we lived in a new subdivision near visayas avenue, and phone service wasn't installed yet. to me, going to PLDT was always an adventure, because it meant a ride in the car and several minutes of talking to our mother who worked in the u.s. it meant snow and beautiful reading material and fat spiral notebooks and endless pens and trendy clothes. it meant she was healthy and happy. it meant she still meant something to us. it never occured to me that the phone calls must have been extremely short to my parents. i didn't recall our trips to PLDT being regular, but it seems to me that they always set a date for it. we would call our mother from an outdoor PLDT phone booth, and she would call us back. whatever date it was, it seemed pretty irregular to me.
all these tasks my dad can no longer do because that reality no longer exists. it does us both no good for me to dwell on it, either. and this is definitely a memory i am keeping from my mother. ahaha. ¶ 6/19/2005 04:22:00 PM
his story wasn't just animated, it was fantastic - no storm could bring in the sea, and yummy fish along with it. later, i'd read about an exact, similar incident written by a writer my dad's age had he not died. and then i believed his fish in the ricefields story. only it was too late, because when he told it, i thought it was the ravings of a sick, old man. now, it was too late for him.
but i like to think that it's not yet too late for me. i can still complete tasks he told me do a long time ago, scenes that remain crystal clear in my head. i understand most of it now.
but i still miss my dad. i think anyone who's ever lost a father to illness or other pathways to the eternal will always miss their dads. it doesn't beat him being around.
he used to drive all of us to the philippine long distance telephone office near the quezon circle, so we can spend some time talking to our mom. we lived in a new subdivision near visayas avenue, and phone service wasn't installed yet. to me, going to PLDT was always an adventure, because it meant a ride in the car and several minutes of talking to our mother who worked in the u.s. it meant snow and beautiful reading material and fat spiral notebooks and endless pens and trendy clothes. it meant she was healthy and happy. it meant she still meant something to us. it never occured to me that the phone calls must have been extremely short to my parents. i didn't recall our trips to PLDT being regular, but it seems to me that they always set a date for it. we would call our mother from an outdoor PLDT phone booth, and she would call us back. whatever date it was, it seemed pretty irregular to me.
all these tasks my dad can no longer do because that reality no longer exists. it does us both no good for me to dwell on it, either. and this is definitely a memory i am keeping from my mother. ahaha. ¶ 6/19/2005 04:22:00 PM
