Highway to Happy: Litol Kiddos No More

Tuesday, May 17, 2011

Litol Kiddos No More

There is that stained scrapbook picture, or a silly remark from a friend recounting old times. Sometimes, it comes from seeing a memento you’ve kept through the years. Regardless of form, whenever something that reminds you of age appears, it hits you at the softest spot. And you know there is nowhere to go but down. Well, down the memory lane, that is.

In my case, what has been dragging me to accept the harsh reality that I am not getting any younger are my youngest cousins. You see, they just live next door but whenever I see them, I still get a little surprised on how fast they grow up, and, needless to say, how fast I grow old.

Alyza and Alyna

I held them all in my arms, those 3 angels, when they were so small you think the smallest movement could break their bones. The summer afternoons after Alyza, the eldest, was born, I spent mostly at their house. I relentlessly bug her yaya to teach me how to carry a baby. I was the youngest in our family so I was terribly excited to have a little person I can take care of.

While they were growing up, I became their constant playmate, the ultimate spoiler. I would buy them gifts for no reason other than wanting to be the favorite ate. And I succeeded in being the one, if I may say. They would storm into my room, make a mess of my bed and I wouldn’t get the least irritated. The 2 girls would watch HSM on Disney channel in my room for a hundred times and the little boy, little may not be a fitting term as you would notice in the picture, wouldn’t complain as long as he had food to munch on.

These days, I get home, walk inside the house after a long day and hear no footsteps marching behind me. I don’t hear little voices asking me if I have work the next day every single night, as if it’s possible for them to hear a ‘No’. And, their reactions, the constant bugging for me to spill the truth of just going out for dates and not working whenever I leave on Saturdays, sometimes Sundays, their naivety of not being able to fathom the idea that one has to work (or simply do anything) on weekends, are priceless.

I bid farewell to my three angels as they migrated with their mom to Canada. I knew long before about their plans of moving but I guess I never let it fully sink in. I cried the day they left. I cried a couple more times the days after that. More than the fact that I’ll miss them, it is the worrying that gets to me the most. They are with their mom, I know. But it’s still different when they are around for me to look after. I feel helpless and, to an extent, I felt they didn’t need their Ate, anymore.

I already miss them; those three little people who annoyingly follow me around the house, who broke all those coffee mugs, who tore the cover of our magazines, who ate breakfast and heard the mass with us every Sunday, who, for years, had been causing all the wonderful chaos in our house. This year would certainly be different and somehow lonely, what with the children-less Christmas and holidays. It would be a heart-rending adjustment. I guess I’ll just have to save for round trip CA tickets! ASAP!