tracing the past

"Is it better to have had a good thing and lost it or never to have had it?"

my mom and i visited the place where she spent her childhood (not entirely) which happened to be 40 years ago. although we went there 14 years back, my first time, she barely remembers the things we did. but to me, it is all vivid like a part of me is stuck in that time and has never made it to the future. maybe for you it won't make sense but to me it does, completely. it has always been my favorite memory. my bright place.

there is a municipality in iloilo named 'leon', and everytime i think about it i remember baguio. well, little did i know that in leon there's this place called 'bucari' which is better known as the little baguio. ghad, i wish i knew earlier. anyway, that is the place where my mother spent her childhood. leon, i mean. she was born and raised in the barrio named 'jamog' /hamog/ and they lived there up until she finished first grade. my grandpa is a missionary pastor so they had to move from one place to another. so after jamog, they lived in leon proper where mom spent her second and third grade.

[edit: my mom wasn't born in jamog, she forgot to tell me this before i wrote this blog]

[newly built building, the public market of leon]

isn't it amazing to have somewhere or something to look back to and remember so many memories? i'm kind of bitter because i don't get to have such, but i'm really happy for my mom as i was watching her walk through the places she once spent a part of her life. there was even a moment when she had teary eyes. i was thinking: 'wow, i'm really her daughter'. hahaha.

[the same water pump my mom and her cousins used to take a bath 40 years ago]

nothing much has changed in the place except for the cemented highway and the mode of transportation. i remember when we visited 14 years ago, we rode by the jeepney and the road was bumpy i almost threw up. but i didn't. my mom told me stories about how she spent her childhood with her fondest of memory. she visited the house where they once lived and it's still there even though nobody lives there anymore. imagine? a house standing still after 40+ years. you know, some things can't just be broken down by any disaster. they may be abandoned but never destroyed.

[this is the house they once lived in]

[this is the plaza where my mom and her playmates used to play at and that exact slide is still the slide they were sliding]

[mom and her first cousin who she haven't recognized at first, uncle nacio]

my grandmom's sisters are the prime reason why we visited, lola idang, their eldest, and lola auring, the third among the siblings (my grandmom is the youngest). i'm so happy to have seen them again after a loooooong time. they remember me as the lively (also lovely, mehehe) little girl that i was. not anymore though. 

[lola auring helping lola idang to remember her siblings]

[lola idang, age 90, still beautiful as ever]

[the street we once passed by, how lovely places can be in our memories. it still is]

[mom: 'be, hindi gid ta magpuli nga wala ko nakapa-picture sa leon'. wish granted]

[the school where my mom went for her second and third grade]

i am really happy for my mom. it feels so nice to have another place to call 'home' away from the home you built for yourself. the home where you will remember all the good things and laugh away the bad ones. there would be people who had watched you grow up and can still tell stories about you when you were together. i wish i had that kind of memory too, but who knows? it's never too late yet! 

and here's my part of the story, my own trace of the past.

one thing you don't know about me is that i'm a sucker for fountains. i feel like a kid again when i see one. and i will not hesitate to play with it.

but this particular fountain, not that beautiful to look at, but everytime i see it, i feel beautiful things happen in my heart. always my bright place.

this is what a perfect day looks like to me:

[7-year old me and dad on the exact fountain, photo taken by mom]

well, sometimes i think about it, what if i never had these memories, what would i be living for now?

if my mom never had these things, we won't be visiting a faraway town in another island and meet people we once shared a part of our lives with. i know these memories can warm us up on the inside, no shit, they also tear us apart but i think it's better that way. i'd rather have the good and the bad memories than not have anything at all. 

xx, gayle