I remain an idiot so that the people around me can be intelligent.

déjà vu

This liqueur crawls down painfully through my throat... slowly seeping its way through my guts. However, not as painful as the hour I've heard of your departure away from home . . . if you could even call it that now.

I really don't know how to properly begin this letter much that I don't know how to react when I've heard that you will be going to the city with your Mother. Away from the province where you've grown under your lola's supervision. This pains me mostly as I have fostered love for you these past few months of my life. I have no regrets.

. . .

Maybe . . . maybe I will start to when times were a lot simpler. Not a lot of distractions there are and not a lot going on with our lives. We were so little, so innocent. Not yet we have grown to be a depressed bunch of people with our eyes glued to phony distractions. The family house was still mostly made of wood and the surroundings, while it may have changed a lot after so many years, still feels the same.

What remained not the same was everything. Years have passed and the family house was torn down. Replaced with a bigger, better, and a more accommodating building. Just a building that is.

I could no longer call this place a family house anymore. What seems to be a second home away from our home here in our town turns out to be a glorification of someone's pride. A statue of power over the family where one decides for the most. They think of what's best for the entire clan simply because they funded and built to entirety walls that surrounds lola in her final days as a living breathing human being. When she passes away, her spirit will remain but the house they have built will feel as empty as a world without inhabitant.

Much to my disappointment, I've always looked at Tita as someone who is forgiving and hospitable since she has helped my Mother when she was very ill when I was younger. If it wasn't for our relative's money (and she became much of a part of that), my Mother would have died. Although, that doesn't seem to be the case now that they do not live here anymore. They have another home away from where they've grown. With our grandmother left. Maybe, their stay there taught them things to become what they are now.

If she would have been more impartial to all of us and treated all of us with fairness and equality, then there would not be any necessary action to move to a place away from home. But it's really not much of a home anymore, less of a family house if someone is not welcome in it... say, for instance, someone who has been a part of our lives; a part of our clan, a part of our stories from way back when times were much simpler. Even your Mother would not really care anymore about the past because all she cares about now is you.

Your Mother has said that she saw your best smile when the both of you came here for a short vacation. The sweetest smile she has seen from her daughter who she has not seen or even taken care of for a long time. I still truly believe, despite all things bad and for the worse in this world, that a mother's love is of no comparison to any. It is insurmountable, overflowing with vigor. I notice your smile when she does little acts of love: combing your hair, fixing your clothes, serving you food on the table, and taking you out for a treat. Even with the littlest of exchange outside the room you sleep in and mostly when the both of you sleep together... like a mother cuddling her newborn baby. That's what it looked like to me. And this love between the two of you is very heartwarming. I could not remember the last time I've seen a mother and a daughter share this kind of love and affection for each other until I saw you and your Mother together.

I hate to express my grieving and distaste towards your Father.

I hate to incorporate the surname of our family to men of lust and womanizing. While that may be the case for some of us, it is inexcusable for a Father not to see his daughter when he has the most chances on a given time. Needless to say, when he had the chance... he did not take it. Was it because he was ashamed? Or is it because he feels guilty for leaving you to lola's guardianship? Or is it because he is scared? Scared that someone might think ill of him when he does pay you a visit?