Things I Never Told You
By: Abby Generalia
As soon as they boarded airplanes headed to the different parts of the world, many Overseas Filipino Workers carry with them the heavy feeling of not being able to look after their families. Together with the hopes for greener pasture and a better future for their loved ones, also packed in their suitcases are the worries of how their departure could affect the entire family.
Broken families as an effect of one of the parents working abroad have become a favorite theme to many Filipino movies and television shows. They have been a topic to many inspirational talks. Unfortunately, many families nowadays are destroyed due to the mere ambition of getting a better financial state, just like that of the young woman who wrote the following letter for his dad on a Father's Day. Hers is a typical story of a Filipino family torn apart by the harsh realities of life in the Philippines.
Dear Papa,
I’m sorry. I’ve been making you
feel hated for the past years. All you’ve been receiving from me were coldness
and numbness, which started on that horrible day I saw you with another woman.
Mama was just
forced to leave us and to spend many years of her life away from us… in that
Promised Land for many OFWs called the Middle East.
She did not want to escape from the responsibilities of raising me. I don’t
know if you were just numb for not feeling the longing in her voice everytime
she made those expensive long-distance calls, merely to ask us how we spent the
week. She only wanted me to be able to finish my studies, which she thought
might be impossible if she just stayed and depend on you… because you never
wanted to work, because you were the laid-back type.
She might have
left me, but I’m sure she was gone with all her unselfish reasons. You were
there physically, but I was not feeling your existence.
Thank you for
leaving me behind, because that made me the kind of person I am right now. I
believe I’m the strongest and toughest young woman alive. I’m glad you made me
stand on my own. I’m happy you let me run my own life based on my own
judgments.
I believe Mama
was right in deciding to work abroad. I just got a bachelor’s degree, a
full-time and a part-time job, a small business and am planning to get a
masters degree. I am now capable of taking good care of her. After almost 15
years of cleaning toilet bowls and babysitting other people’s children, she can
now come home.
And you were
also back… with nothing else but your liver disease. You want me to take care
of you now that you’re sick. Mama told me to accept you as you don’t have any
other place to go to, that after all, you’re still my dad.
For the past months, I’ve been
witnessing you struggling with your disease. But in spite of the physical pain
you feel, you still make sure the meal is already prepared as soon as I wake
up. You iron my clothes everyday. You always fix my beddings because I never do
that. I knew you wanted to pay for all those years you were on credit as a good
father to me.
This Father’s Day, I want to give
the best gift I can ever hand you… and that’s forgiveness. It’s not yet too
late to start anew. I want you to know that I love you and those years of
leaving me would never change that.
Mama is already coming home and I’m glad that you are now home. Happy Father’s Day!
Love,
Hannah
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