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In about two weeks I will be leaving the United States behind on a very long flight across the vast expanse of the Pacific Ocean. I will be leaving behind most of my close family (Mom’s coming with) and my friends and all of the things I’ve grown up with in Southern California. You see, I’m making a pilgrimage. Perhaps the last great pilgrimage I will ever take with my Mom. We are going back to the land of her youth, the place she still remembers as “home” even though she’s lived as a US citizen twice as long as she lived there. Destination… Philippines. Time since my last visit… 30 years.
That’s right, I’ve not been back to the Philippines since I was 8. That was 180lbs and several feet ago. (My how I’ve grown.)
My Mom as many of you know has been dealing with a great deal of medical issues over the past ten years. My sisters and I work hard to provide her a stable and happy life here while making sure her meds are taken regularly and that she is never alone should she fall down. The details of what ails her aren’t important, but it’s a situation that will never get better… and will eventually get a lot worse before the end.
With that great thought in mind, Mom has been anxiously praying that she could take one more trip to her homeland. To see her family once more. Many of them will never be able to come to U.S. to visit, because of health issues and because of finances. So for Mom the only way to be able to hug a majority of her family is to get her there to do so. Theresa and Bryan were kind enough to pay for Mom to go home as a Christmas present. Mom was elated, to say the least. But it didn’t take long for her to become nervous about traveling all the way to the Philippines alone. That’s where I stepped in and said that I want to go too. My return to the Philippines is long overdue. And I don’t want to miss this final chance to see the country with my Mom.
I am really looking forward to visiting with her. Seeing my family is important. In many ways I feel very detached from my filipino heritage. I barely eat the food, I don’t speak the language and I have no accent. My looks are filipino with a decidedly european flair… most often people think I’m of some spanish descent. (Which isn’t entirely wrong since Mom’s dad was half Spanish.) I am eager to spend some quality time with my aunts and uncle (I’ve already lost two of my filipino uncles). I look forward to meeting their children. This is quality time that is very much needed for me.
But I’m also looking forward to seeing the places my Mom grew up. In getting her stories on film. (I’m bound to be rolling the video camera virtually non-stop, and snapping thousands of photos.) Mom’s memories are spotty at best. Even on good days. It is my hope that talking to her about her past while visiting the actual locations of her memories will help spark some clarity in her and allow me some access to a life I know very little about.
My parents have always been a strange puzzle to me. My Dad was an open book with whom I spoke at great length about his childhood, his time in the Navy during Vietnam and about his life with my Mother after he married her and moved her to the states. We even took a trip, just the two of us, to Idaho a couple of years before he died to see the first three houses he lived in with Mom in the city where I was born. We visited the hospital I was born in and he told me story after story of that time in his life. Mom, on the other hand, has rarely spoken to me about her childhood. Most of what I know I have pieced together through second hand tales handed down to me by my father or by my Uncle Francis before they died. Mom’s childhood was filled with hardships and she has a hard time revisiting those memories most times.
It is my hope, that we will be able to tap into the happier memories of her childhood while we are there. At the very least, I hope that I can walk down the street where my father first heard her singing inside a bar/club. After all, the start of their story is truly the starting point of mine, and I want a clearer picture of the first chapter.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]
