connections...

"Blood is thicker than water", an old cliche na masyado ng gasgas so to speak but will always hold true among every family. A few days ago I posted on public what to me can be considered a very private journal entry. It was written few years back for my father. For some reason, I just felt like posting it and so I did without giving it much thought. I bare my heart and soul in that piece and it did evoked different comments and views from friends and loved ones alike. All of them were taken in good spirit, hehe!

My dad has been an OFW for as long as I can remember. When I was young and I think of him, all I can see is a plane taking off or the jewelries I will be receiving in a few more months. Everything was superficial back then. Suki na sya ng mga airlines bound to Saudi Arabia. That was the second country i remember i was able to write when i was in Kinder after learning to write Philippines syempre. Then I grew up with my Lola and Lolo who think the world of me (spoiled brat? nah! I'm not).

Needless to say being an OFW is never and i guess will NEVER be an easy job, either for those who will be working overseas and to the families they will be leaving behind. Our local church pastor is even vocal in saying those jobs post a big threat on our family as a unit. You never see your children grow and so you end up not knowing them at all, some marital responsibility will be overlooked and so the risk on being cheated is on and will highly be there, the physical and emotional distance he said will test every part of the family and if you're not strong enough...you might lose it. "Is it worth it?" I once asked my dad then he would say "May choice ba tayo?" and I'd fell silent. Oo nga naman, our country is rich with talented and brilliant people but its the resources or the opportunity of a good job that we are lacking. As a result some people pack their things and with eyes half closed they go to a different land and seek a "greener pasture" like what my dad did. Not because he wanted to but more because he NEEDED to. On our end naman we tried to have our presence felt by him. Snail mail pa lang ang uso noon and of course a few calls every once in a while. Maybe that developed my love for writing, and the burning desire for PLDT to install a phone in our house has influenced me too in a way, so ngayon Call Center agent ako, haha!

Physical distance from your family especially your kids can be a good faith-testing-exercise. Your strength and patience being developed whenever there's a bad news about the country lalo na pag sa pamilya, nakaka loka talaga! But like what dad once said "we don't have much choice daughter". Because there are people who rely and depend on us and we love them too much to let them down. So the new label for OFW "Bagong Bayani" fits them well. Hopefully more than just the label there will also be an added benefits for the unsung heroes.

My dad was not an exclusion in those pain and so am I being his child. His constantly being away and the diminishing communication with him made the love somehow withered and insecurity slowly crawled in. Communication just like in any relationship be it short, medium or long distance is very important like water to plants, oxygen to humans, fertilizer to soil, we just can't live without it. Buti nga ngayon there are so many ways to communicate, there's internet that allows you to even see the person on your screen, cellphones to call and TEXT to the point that our thumb gets stiff, snail mail of course (i find it sweeter pa nga to receive one), there are so many medium now to communicate to somehow lessen the pain of missing one another.

Two days after posting that painful journal entry out of the chest i received a call from my stepmom, telling me my dad is in the hospital and in not so good of a condition. Without doubts and hesitation i went to see him. He look pleased in seeing me though he was in ICU, he opened his eyes three times to look and smiled at me. I stayed with him everyday at the hospital and realized how fragile LIFE is. I could have lost him without telling him i love him. Well, that will be water under the bridge now.

I wonder why did i post that journal? Is it because I've been thinking about my dad lately and pains me to realize how did we end up to? Or is it because he's been thinking about me too or could it be because he was in the hospital at that time? And just what a coincidence of after posting it we finally have both the courage to face the ugly truth that we lost each other somewhere along the tracks? But that's okay, we learn from our mistakes. No matter how painful it is its still a lesson well learned.

"Relationships, not achievements or the acquisition of things, are what matters most in life". In my experience, I allowed too much pain and insecurity along with self pity to see beyond my father's motives in working abroad. It was hard for me but must be hell for him too! In my deepest understanding of what a FAMILY is, i came to realize that no matter what you've been through, where you've been at and how different you seem to be, CONNECTION will always be there in different forms and different meanings. For almost every bad fall or bad things that happens to us our FAMILY will always be the last to leave us, after all as an old cliche says "Blood is thicker than water".