*SILENT TEARS*

The next most eventful day of 2007. Two of my best friends, those I call upon as family had decided to up and go back home. FOR GOOD. For all sorts of legitimate reasons, I could only say I understand, but the pain would not go away.

Relationships with these two people were almost impossible to describe. Friends turned into family with a love that knows no boundaries, embraces different cultures and celebrates all victories. What else could I ask for when I had the privilege of sharing these special moments with them?

The airport is a funny place. Ten out of ten times, the tears would come when I stood at the departure gates, about to be separated from family. Surely I had not expected myself anything less when I sent both my sister and brother off. It was a double whammy when they chose to leave on the same day. Woe to me, or the better for me, either way, it was a bucketful of tears.

Ree and Aikee, I know that I will celebrate your lives despite the distance and gap and even lack of communication. But I love to believe that absence makes the heart grow fonder. This is my little heartfelt inscriptions to the both of you.

My sister:
I don’t know how we do what we did to develop such a bonding. Perhaps the gym not only strengthened our physical muscles, it tightened our mental and spiritual ones too. You had given me a love that is unconditional, very rarely keeping count of my wayward stints and moments of lack towards you. Your perseverance had brought us thus far. And just like you said, our love will be for eternity only because it is such a natural thing to love family, despite the ugliness of it all.

My brother:
Our dedication first to work, then to a friendship, then to faith, hope and love which surpasses all understanding. What pained me was the knowledge that I cannot journey with you hereafter till I see you again, on a daily basis, also the one way in which we find most contentment to share life. You, like me, strive to live a full life. Our hearts warm in the same fashion, desiring for not just abundant life in the physical comforts, but more so in the freedom that we know – the rejection of oppressed systems, ideas, doctrines and other kinds of entrapments.

When with the both of you, either individually or together, you often leave me with no words. Not because I feel inadequate to speak in front of you, rather, the realization that even before I speak, you already knew my heart, my intentions. Just want to say thank you for all of that, and that you both have such special and important places in my heart.

I love you both so much, and will hope to see you two soon.