Leaving Tracks

” Are you ready for me to leave ? ” the child asked while on his death bed. It was a resounding NO from the mother, ” I’m not ready yet and I will NEVER be ready for you to leave.”

Those were the last conversation my late cousinbear had with Tita, the rest were nothing but crying out for pain, fighting back for LIFE because he knows he can’t leave yet…not till she’s ready. But will we ever be ready for something so final as goodbye ? No matter how you look at it, how you draw the scene, no amount of preparation will make us say goodbye the easy way. There’s always this tug in your core that feels a certain pain no matter what kind of heart you’re made of.

Its almost the same kind of feeling whenever I go to the airport to send off my husband to another land. It’s a constant effort to convince me that I need to drag my kids with us making my suffering twice the amount. I don’t want them to have the idea of separation from him no matter how short 1 or 2 years is. The last hug, the take care, the i love you, then the final walk you painfully watch because you know it will take awhile to see him walk back again from that glass panel doors. I never get used to it, every year is just like the first time he went away to work abroad. The pain of saying goodbye is always there…year after year.

At work I tried to be unattached to anyone in particular. Loner is just a good word to substitute ” Autistic ” I guess. It takes a good amount of faith and trust to make me feel relax to that person. When they leave, you wonder the very reason you’d decided to put down your defenses, putting yourself an easy target. When Bossman said he’s leaving for a career growth, there comes that old feeling. Of leaving, of goodbyes…the pain, hurt, anxiety just differ in levels but its still there.

I realize that leaving though may be a hard part for almost all of us, its still manageable. Because those people have been part of our lives, played different roles in our story, have made an impact on who and where we are now. Then no amount of separation, whether temporary or permanent could ever erase the tracks they left behind in our lives. They all made their marks distinct from the rest. Its there to remind us and a lane for us to visit when we feel too far away from them.

To my cousinbear JanJan, to my Hon, my Bossman and to those who will come and go, here’s to a safe trip… and a meaningful journey.