Just within this week, I have attended three separate commencement exercises. Just within this week, many of my friends have went home already while some have travelled far going to places they have never been before. The next days would mean a new start. For students, summer vacation is really one of the most awaited time of the year. I could still remember my classmates beginning to have their countdown as early as February anticipating for that day when they they could scream their ’summer is here!’
Summer reminds me of so many past experiences one of which was when I was lost because I rode the wrong jeepney. I found my way home but I was changed with what I saw while our trip was going on. When I saw a kid, perhaps eight or nine-year old helping his father clearing-up the sugarcane plantation under the blazing sun, I was transformed into a different person. When my eyes glanced towards the direction of a bare-footed mother carrying a baby and a sack of their belongings, I bowed down my head in the thought that they haven’t stopped walking even at once. We were both lost but there’s a big difference. I know I am leading to somewhere. I only have to find it again while she may not even know where she and her baby were going at all. The ride continued only to bring me more tragedy. In the intercession, there was traffic and a man screaming at the top of his voice as if he got all the authority. He was driving a van. Next to the van was a trisikad and an old man, which appears to be more than 65. I don’t know what the whole story was, but upon seeing the worried face of the old man picking up the scattered grains of uncooked rice in the high-way with his calloused hands, the thin plastic bag torn apart, the sympathetic atmosphere created by the passengers like me, the irritated look of the man in the van who seems to be in a hurry and the series of the deafening sound of horns from the lined-up vehicles, I don’t need to witness everything in the scene. It was enough. I examined the old man and heard him whisper in dialect, “Now, my grandchildren had nothing to eat. Tonight will be just another night that they should sleep early to escape the call of their stomachs.” In my mind, it wasn’t fair…Then I opened my pocket and asked myself how much it cost now to buy a kilo of rice and I realized it wasn’t enough. And so I cried. And the jeepney went on.My fellow passengers expressed their emotions too…As the road way back gets clearer and clearer, my thoughts go with it, too. What if it’s summer and it rained? Will it still be summer? My one ride in that wrong jeepney revealed to me some of the sad realities in life…
Now, it’s summer. It’s a time when kids living in farms and mountains would spend extra time under the rain or sun helping their father. It’s a time when a person who has been busy for a long time can pose for a while to get life and drop by in the church. It’s a time for students to prepare themselves for another journey to begin or for some face the consequences of not attending their classes before. It’s a time to showcase the creativity of Filipinos when it comes to summer businesses and fashionable summer accessories…It’s my time to be useful just like any other seasons of our lifetime. It’s time to evaluate and to learn practically. Summer, summer, summer. Thank God for Summer!
Summer does not mean it won’t rain but still, summer makes us thirst for something, and perhaps, someone too…
This summer vacation, may we not forget the value of spending time with our family and above all with God despite so many choices and alternatives this world presents before us. May we all experience justice and love. May we all find wonderful moments to reflect and contemplate too so that we will grow and enjoy more…If we have started spending our summer productively, then individually, we will be knowing what others have done. I would then know what you did last summer…
Have a great summer vacation! God Bless us all…
(Above's post was first posted on April 23, 2009 with the title, 'I Know What You Did Last Summer' in my Friendster Blog, "Going Home to My Heart".)
No comments:
Post a Comment