have you ever had that time when you look around you and there’s just nothing to appreciate?
you get up early in the morning. do your usual off-the-bed routines. go straight to the kitchen. open the fridge. sigh! don’t we have anything different for breakfast? well you don’t really have a choice. so you fix the usual.
you get your kids ready for school. you try to move as fast as you can so as not to be late for work. you have to get your husband’s work stuff ready, take a shower, take 7 kilometers drive to your son’s school…traffic…!!!… then take another 8 kilometers to work….more traffic!
you get to work. turn on your computer. wipe up your desk. another sigh! this is going to be a long day….
i’ve been feeling this way for the past few days… up until yesterday…
i work in a travel agency. on my way to work, i got a call on my mobile phone…an unfamiliar voice…of course, i assumed must be an inquiry. i was right. her voice was shaky, she must be really in a hurry to purchase a ticket. she wanted to get a flight for his brother that same day, i told her that would not be possible as the only flight going to his place is 1pm. it was 10am then. check in time would be 2 hours before the flight. considering the time it would take for him to come to our office, drive all the way to the airport…he just won’t make it. she understood. she said he’ll just get the earliest flight for the next morning.
when she got to our office, she told me the reason why his brother had to fly as soon as possible. his 7year old son died. dengue fever. the airline was taking quite longer than usual to issue the ticket so she had the chance to tell me something more about herself, her family and what had happened. her family is from the south. she and her brother had to come all the way up north to work, to be able to earn a little money to support their family. she has been working with a minimum wage for the past 8 years. she was able to bring a couple of her nieces to school…they are now in college. his brother (the passenger), has 4 kids and has been a widower for 7 years. the 7 year old child who passed away had been having on and off fever for the past couple of weeks. due to their location, which is a little far from the city, and due to their financial status….they really didn’t have the means to get him checked thoroughly. it started with a flu, until the child didn’t want to eat anymore, and just before he passed, there was blood in his feces. the lady couldn’t help her tears when she was telling me all these. she just visited them last week. since she only gets a once in a lifetime chance to do this, she took her nieces and nephews out, went to the mall and shopped for them. ” if i only knew this was going to happen, i shouldn’t have took them out and bought all those shirts and shoes for them. i could’ve just took him to the hospital instead.” those were her words. and to add more to their burden, the poor child’s remains are still being held in the morgue, it will not be released until they provide the payment of a little over $100. they do not have any idea where to get the money… you can never imagine how big a deal little things ( maybe for you ) are for other people. my body was frozen the whole time. my heart sank deeper when she said his brother’s wife died of giving birth to the child. it was too late during her pregnancy when they found out she was sick. the doctor made them choose between the life of the mother or the baby. the mother insisted to save the baby. “they are together now.” she said.
the second she stepped out of our office, i balled in tears. suddenly i felt something that’s just unexplainable and i just couldn’t stop crying… i realized how ungrateful i’ve become. i’ve been bitching about things that i should actually be thankful for. i was ashamed.
guilt. pure guilt.
i have been so blessed. all these time, i am blessed! i have a hardworking husband who loves and cares so much about his family. he’s more than worthy of all the morning shirt presses. i have 2 little boys who are healthy enough to jump up and down the bed and fill our house with noise and mess! i get the chance to hug them goodnight and kiss them good morning everyday. (they have both just recovered from simple viral flu and all i can do is complain about traffic on my way to the school??!!) i have a job that is scheduled just perfectly so i still have the time to spend with my family. neither i nor my husband have to work too far just so our kids can have hotdogs and eggs for breakfast. i have genuine friends whom i can run to anytime and never judge me of my shortcomings. these are only a few to mention…i could go on!
The only thing i could do at that time was pray. Thank God for all the blessings, for all the opportunities, for the love… I truly, from the bottom of my heart, am sorry for being so blinded, for being so shallow, for being such an ungrateful child.
i know for sure that story will linger in my mind and will forever be nailed in my heart. may God bless their family. things like this happen in reality. i am truly humbled to have learned from their story a very important lesson in life.
happiness, indeed, doesn’t come as a result of getting something we don’t have, but rather of recognizing and appreciating what we do have.
