Dear Inang,
I'm sorry this comes late for Mother's Day. During that day, I couldn't write a single note for you. I tried, but all I could remember was that morning in the kitchen a month before. It was the most poignant scene, the one I could easily recall; though at that time, I didn't realize its effect on me. I think of it now, like a reader flipping through the pages of an old photo album, turning back to that event in just one glance.
It was the morning I arrived with my brother and two sisters from the hospital in San Fernando. Tatang, whom we fetched with a hired ambulance, was lying lifeless, half-covered with a blanket on the wooden bed in the sala. While everyone around me was crying and groaning, I stood there frozen. My heart was in ecstatic pain. I was looking out the window, but seeing nothing. I was contemplating our loss when you suddenly came to me, held my shoulder, and sobbed.
