One Lazy Sunday Afternoon Walk, A Thousand Memories

Because I haven't blogged in a really long while (sorry, Arki student problems), here's a little something for everyone to read. 

Hello, Mom, Dad, siblings, cousins, titos, titas, and everyone else from Villa Patria. This is for you. *hearts*

Sunday afternoon in Villa Patria is always the most peaceful time of the week. Everyone's just taking their siestas, or they just simply stay indoors. Earlier today, as I was walking around our village, I felt a sudden rush of nostalgia as I pictured my childhood in every still photograph I took. 

This place, I thought, holds a chunk of the most priceless moments of my past; me and my cousins on our bikes, threading through the smallest nooks of our village, stealing our boy's tri-sikad and intentionally crashing into the bushes, playing basketball the whole day until dusk, getting scratches all over from the bougainvillea, going on "jungle adventures" behind the chapel, who-can-swing-highest contests and hearing our hearts beat in our ears when the base of the swing starts getting unanchored from the ground, playing hide-and-seek until dark and running for our lives when some sore loser starts swearing he's heard an aswang, playing sikyo until someone gets hurt, having lunch in whoever's house you're at in that moment, getting chased by Lola Ning's dogs, catching Bito's fish and keeping them in a huge basin then putting them back in the pond before running for our lives when he catches us, kicking Norma's pail of water (everyday) and again, running for our dear lives, getting all sorts of rashes from catching grasshoppers, and getting all sweaty and dirty from playing the whole day, to be followed by a run down to the beach.

It saddens me a little how my younger siblings and cousins would never get to experience most of these things as much as it saddens me how I've grown out of my childhood. I'm in my third year in college now, and I've only been here for a week after five straight months in Manila. It was only when I started studying in Manila when I realized that I live in such a beautiful place. Too bad I only go home three times a year, and that would probably decrease in the years to come. In a few days, I'm turning 19, and these are all but precious memories, securely filed and shelved at the back of my mind. 

Anyway, last night I stumbled upon a friend's tweet that read, "home is not a place, it's a feeling."

And I am home.