mundane dinners & the real meaning of happiness

i've developed this fear since the pandemic started.
i don't know if it's reasonable or if i'm the only one that has it.
maybe other people have had it even before the pandemic began.
or... when i think about it, i probably had it even before the pandemic.

if i had a therapist, this would probably be a really interesting session to talk about. i have this fear of having certain dinners as my last with the people i was with at the time. so many people have died in the last year and a half. and i've been left with a culmination of dinner stories. some of which can never happen again because the table will always be two or three seats empty. or maybe a whole table waiting to be filled.

there will always be space to fill.

but no one will be able to fill the space.

i think, i've had this thought before from my first experience with Death.
it was 2005, the year Tatay (my grandfather from my father's side) died. i never believed he was really gone until i was the only one that wanted to leave space for him everywhere we went. it was probably my way of grieving at the age of 4. i didn't cry during the whole wake. i was taught to believe that he was just sleeping. and that his casket was just a fancy bed. (though i did say that the glass might not let him breathe) but i cried when they started lowering him down his grave and burying him.

after the funeral, i always left a seat for him at the table for dinner. i placed a space next to my car seat, letting no one sit on it because I always said it was for Tatay. and that Tatay was sitting next to me. we always got a table in restaurants with excess chairs (or maybe those were just coincidences), and i would leave a space in between me and the next person. because it was always for Tatay.

as i grew up, the space i kept vacant enclosed.
my memory of Tatay faded.

i'd be lying if i said i could still remember what his voice sounded like. to this day, i still keep digging for memories. for sounds. for smell. for the feeling of his touch.

but my body has renewed through the years.
even the memory my own skin once knew will never be found.

this is probably why i grew up taking more photos, more videos, started vlogging, and savoring every dinner i had with the people i love. i always kept myself off limits from my phone, tried to listen. if there weren't any conversations, i would just savor the silence together with my meal. which was actually not common because there were always conversations talked about at dinner.

when Nanay (my grandmother from my father's side) was still alive a little over a year ago, there would always be daily chismis. when the chismis stopped, that's when we knew something was already wrong. Nanay was known for a lot of things but she certainly wasn't known for silence.

you know what?

let's talk about a different dinner memory.

i still feel so hurt talking about people i love in past tense.

let's talk about the present.

tonight, we had a really good dinner. Mom and Dad chatted mostly about work, church, relatives that didn't look like they were siblings if we didn't know, and our favorite topic---food. it was definitely an incidental leftover night dinner. we had leftover spaghetti, a piece of lumpiang toge from lunch, half a piece of hotdog and two pandesals from breakfast, and some carbonara from Mom's lunch given to them at the hospital. i vaguely remember but i think there was also tortang giniling from Mom's lunch.

they both had Big Scoop ice cream (mango & avocado). i had mine during my merienda time (chocolate cookie dough). when Mom finished cleaning out the rest of the glasses, she cornered me to cook corned beef. it was fun! i always love participating in food-making.

that's when it hit me that i wanted to write this post.

i've been reading The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin and i think i've cracked parts of the code for my own happiness. THP helped me realize that all of my bucket list goals have been my own version of a happiness project all along. and that most of the things that guarantee my long-term happiness is my relationship with my parents.

because even if some people deny it, happiness roots from where you are currently residing and the people you're with. as for me, i still live with my parents.

i have to admit though, no matter how much screen time they invest in browsing through Facebook, watching lives, watching Pepito Manoloto, or window shopping on Lazada or Shopee, we always make time to agree on common ground. we just have this strange family bond that just cultivated over the years.

i don't know how it happens but it's always exciting to be with my parents. especially when i have dinner with them in or out of the house. there are always stories to tell, new food to try, a different environment to sit back and enjoy.

that's when i knew that happiness isn't what i can possess.
it's in the people i choose to keep in my life.
i'm thankful and blessed that my parents are a huge part of it.

most people don't have that.

but i do.

-e.c.