stories stories stories
Sometimes I get so swept up in how hectic my life is. All I can ever worry about is AP this or SAT's in May or getting this done for that event. I hate how trivial I sound all the time. I've realized that if I were to look at myself from the outside, I'd seem like the kind of person consumed with self-importance. Not to say I'm going to turn right back around and donate my life to humanitarian efforts, but I sat down today and realized something about myself that's more important than what's going on right now, and that's my past.
I remember being little, listening to my grandpa's old stories from when he was a sailor. The only story I ever really remember is the one where he buys my grandma's engagement ring in Saudi Arabia, but I suddenly realized there so much more I've never learned or cared to learn about when it came to his past or his life. My mom randomly mentioned how he used to play tennis in the Philippines, and it quirked my attention, so I asked him before I went into my room to do homework. That one question led to a million more, and I became curious as he described how he traveled around the world, where he lived back home, and we even started making plans for what we wanted to do next Christmas when the whole family goes.
"I've been everywhere," he told me, "Russia, France, England, Romania, Africa, Arabia, Japan. All the big cities, and ..." he pauses and laughs to himself, "we painted the town red every night. We were sailors, you know? I had a girlfriend in every city."
I smiled when he told me that. He also told me, "the most beautiful women in the world, you'll find them in Colombia. The women there, their faces looked like the Virgin Mary."
He has photos from every city, but there all back at home in Manila. I want him to write stories about his life, so I can read them, and my children can read them, and their children can read them. I never realized how amazing his life was, how much there was to learn and remember.
Even though he was so happy when we started talking, he seemed sad by the end. He cried a little as he kept talking, and I kind of started to also. I hate myself for waiting so long to actually care, to really make the effort to understand him and his life.
I just hate how, in life, you really only start cherishing something once there's a time limit on how long you can have it.
I remember being little, listening to my grandpa's old stories from when he was a sailor. The only story I ever really remember is the one where he buys my grandma's engagement ring in Saudi Arabia, but I suddenly realized there so much more I've never learned or cared to learn about when it came to his past or his life. My mom randomly mentioned how he used to play tennis in the Philippines, and it quirked my attention, so I asked him before I went into my room to do homework. That one question led to a million more, and I became curious as he described how he traveled around the world, where he lived back home, and we even started making plans for what we wanted to do next Christmas when the whole family goes.
"I've been everywhere," he told me, "Russia, France, England, Romania, Africa, Arabia, Japan. All the big cities, and ..." he pauses and laughs to himself, "we painted the town red every night. We were sailors, you know? I had a girlfriend in every city."
I smiled when he told me that. He also told me, "the most beautiful women in the world, you'll find them in Colombia. The women there, their faces looked like the Virgin Mary."
He has photos from every city, but there all back at home in Manila. I want him to write stories about his life, so I can read them, and my children can read them, and their children can read them. I never realized how amazing his life was, how much there was to learn and remember.
Even though he was so happy when we started talking, he seemed sad by the end. He cried a little as he kept talking, and I kind of started to also. I hate myself for waiting so long to actually care, to really make the effort to understand him and his life.
I just hate how, in life, you really only start cherishing something once there's a time limit on how long you can have it.