An Open Letter: Sisters Forever [Part One]

Thank you so much for gracing my blog with your presence! When I was a kid, my elder sister told me in not so many words to memorize the countries of the world and its flags but because I was not a diligent student, I didn’t. 😛

Today, I’m looking for at least one person from each country to greet my sister and wish her well. Here is why. ❤

Earlier this year my elder sister Ate[1] Mae was advised by the doctors to undergo a thyroid surgery. Scared, my sister refused. We’d convince her and she’d say yes and then she’d say no again. Needless to say, we’ve had plenty of arguments since and right now she’s nowhere near to saying yes again.

I have no doubt I can convince her again but at the same time, I wanted her to feel relaxed, to feel as at ease as she possibly can given the circumstances and this is where I need your help.

You, yes you, the one reading this, I’d like to appeal for your compassion. If you could write a line or two to help my sister find her courage in order to face this I’d be truly grateful. To our friends and relatives reading this, if you could send Ate Mae an empathy card, an ecard, or if you could type a comment below please do. It would mean the world to me. I just want her to know that even if she’s the one going under the knife, she’s not truly alone in this, that the entire world is behind her.

Thank you for reading this post and I hope everything is going your way wherever you are in this world. If you want to get to know my sister, please read on.

My elder sister Ate Mae and me.

I had never known the love of our parents.

Our mother died when I was only ten days old and our father shipped off leaving my sister and me under our maternal grandparents’ care, our brother under our paternal grandparents.

As a result, my eight year older sister Ate Mae tried very hard to make up for that loss. She became a mother, a father, a sister, a brother to me all rolled into one. Ate Mae always had my back. For as long as I can remember, she always took care of me. Always.

While the other kids had their moms or dads to teach them how to read, count, and tell time I had her to do that for me instead. While the other children had their moms or dads to tuck them in and tell them bedtime stories, I had our grandma, but Ate always made sure I was fine before heading to her own bed. While the other kids had their dads giving them airplanes and piggy back rides, I had Ate Mae do that for me.

Where other children her age played outside, Ate Mae stayed inside to help our ailing grandparents do the household chores and take care of her baby sister. Where the other children had their parents buy their toys for them, Ate saved money whenever possible so she could buy me a balloon, a candy, or plastic balloon, or tea party play sets, teapots, and dinnerware. And because there was never really enough money to begin with, my creative sister improvised.

Sure, she bought me paper dolls, but she made most of it. She drew images on the cardboard, cut it out, color the hair, draw its body parts, and painstakingly design its clothes. Ate Mae made sure my paper dolls had plenty of clothes for each type of occasions: gowns for parties, Sunday dresses, house clothes, pants, shorts, tank tops. Ate Mae also sewed dresses for the Barbie doll our Uncle Dieg got for me when I turned seven.

My sister’s motto was always Josephine first. When I started going to school and had needed help with anything? Did I have projects, drawings, assignments? Ate Mae did everything without me even asking. I was not a diligent student so she wrote my notes on my spotless notebooks whenever the teacher required it; I only had to inform her. I needed a lunchbox? Ate Mae prepared it for me.

She spoiled me rotten. I cannot count the things she did for me, there were so many, and she did those out of love.

My brave sister for once, is scared. Ate, you need not be. The entire world will be thinking of you and praying for you. This time we got your back. This is my promise to you.

[1] Meaning older sister.

In Memoriam: ♥ In My Heart (Mom) ♥

A mother’s love
is the kind of love that transcends space and time.

But that was according to others
who have felt their mother’s love,

Frozen like my heart is this time of year.
[Passing of Seasons taken by AJ Matt and used with permission]

unlike me

but then sometimes
when I fall into slumber,
I dream about you

somehow I feel your love
in my dreams, you are real
your hugs, your touch
your smiles, your laughter
you are very much alive

there you were
opening your arms to me
ordering me to come to you
hugging me
and letting my unshed tears flow
listening to me
letting me speak up
speak the words I left unspoken
letting me do the things I left undone
letting me bare my pains
that I’ve kept deep inside me
that I’ve tried to conceal

there you were
filling the emptiness in my heart
and willing me to struggle and hold on

somehow in my dreams
you were there
guiding me, helping me
teaching me as you’ve taught others
assuring me of things
that I felt uncertain of
telling me that everything
will be fine
that everything
will be alright
telling me things
that I long to hear

you were there
beaming a confident smile
telling me that I can do it
when I felt so unsure of myself

somehow you were there
trying to make me smile
when I felt like crying
when I felt so down

in my dreams
you are within my reach
within my arm’s length

in my dreams
I can hug you
I can say that I’m so proud of you
and most of all
that I love you

but when I wake up
I’ll realize my dreams were nothing
but a farce

but sometimes
when I feel the wind’s touch
in my face, blowing the strands of my hair,
somehow I knew it was you
touching me, toying with my hair, hugging me
and when I heard the wind’s whisper
and the rustling of leaves
I knew it was you
talking to me
and as rain pelted my back
somehow I knew it was you
crying for me
willing me to go on

or sometimes as I see the sun smiling
I felt it was you
promising the joy that the day brings
telling me everything’s going to be fine

or sometimes as I see the stars blinking
somehow I knew it was you
staring back at me
watching over me

somehow I knew you were somewhere
somehow I knew that you love me too
somehow I knew you were there…
very much alive…

Author’s note:

No matter how many years pass me by, I still feel the pain of the might-have-beens.

Happy 68th birth anniversary, Mom.

Or was it supposed to be 67th? Hell, I don’t even know the exact number. But, whatever. What does it matter? It’s not going to bring you back. What matters is that you are loved. And will forever be remembered through me… through us.

We love you.

Date written: March 06, 1998 – Friday 8:55PM – 9:30PM

This was written one month before my 19^th birthday, one month and 10 days before my mom’s 19^th death anniversary… It’s almost 16 years since I’ve written this, and yet, I still feel the same.

Mom, this is for you…wherever you are…I know you already found peace.

Throwback Thursday: To the Greatest Sister in the World

 I feel like most of our lives, all we ever did was say hello and goodbye.
Amidst all the partings and grieving, we do not say the words but I feel the love.
Belated happy birthday, Ate. For once, I’d like to say it.
I love you.

***

with my husband, Mark; my sister Ate Mae; and my nephew Jonrae

Though my elder sister and I grew up together, there were many times when we had to part.

The first time was when she graduated from high school. I was nine at the time. She left our small island in Laoang, Northern Samar for Manila so she could go to college. Our uncle—our deceased mother’s younger brother—was supposed to take her in. My sister, however, knew our uncle had already helped us enough, so she went with our father instead. But our father didn’t send her to college.

A year later, our maternal grandparents who raised us, died. They went 22 days apart. She didn’t learn about it at once so when she finally went home, it was already for our grandmother’s funeral. She refused to go back to our father after that, preferring to stay with me so she could take care of me. This time around, I really felt we were orphans. Though I never voiced it out, I was glad and at the same time, relieved she was there with me.

The second time she had to go away, it was because our aunt—our mother’s younger sister—sent her to one of our relatives to become a yaya to our distant baby cousin. That would be over a year later after our grandparents’ death. I was 11.

She came back for me a month after I turned 13. I couldn’t bear living with our aunt and uncle anymore, I wanted out. It was then when I stopped schooling for a year. In desperation, my sister wrote to our father who was then in Alabat Island in Quezon province, and asked him to take us in. And he did.

We lived again together for a few months but our father and stepmother sent her away to care for an old woman that was the mother of her godfather—our father’s friend. For two years we’d write each other, until I left our father’s home and asked her to live with me. This would be my senior year in high school.

We parted again after a year, when I went to college. We won’t live together again until after six years, when she got pregnant with my nephew. The guy left her to fend for herself and their child. I told her I would take care of them but then she probably didn’t want to be a burden to me, so she went to live with our aunt in Alabat, Quezon—our father’s younger sister—instead.

It frustrated me a lot, how it seemed to me like she didn’t want to live with me. I’ve been coercing her and our brother since I was 13—that we live together. The idea that we will be a ‘complete’ family even if we didn’t have parents was appealing to me. Apparently to them, it was not. It was after all, economically difficult if not impossible, for a 13, 17, and a 21 year-old to live together. And so, they would just listen to me rumble on and on and make plans of things that I wanted for the three of us. As if they were just indulging me.

I know deep down my brother and sister were doing just that. Even as I was saying those things, I knew, the things we lost are now lost forever. We could never get them back. Just how the time and love we lost will never be again ours.

But that is another matter for another day.

My sister won’t come back from Alabat until after four years though I did visit them a few times. By then, I had already given up asking her to live with me.

When our father died, I had the opportunity to talk to our aunt alone during his wake. She told me amusing anecdotes about my sister. Apparently, while my sister was under her care, they opened a sari-sari store. It was my sister who repacked their goods for sale. Our aunt related how Ate seemed to count every piece of garlic, every piece of peanut diligently, consistently to the point that it was amusing and at the same time, exasperating.

She felt that way because, you see, it was not as if she would ask my sister why a pack of peanuts have more quantity in them than the rest. But indeed, that is her through and through. Every pack must be evenly numbered, down to the last grain, no matter what that is.

Our aunt commented how the millionaires of this world could use an advice or two from my sister on how to save and earn more revenue from just about everything. True, that.

We were both amused, we were both laughing. I laughed with our aunt for what it was because that is my sister all right

My pitiful sister.

She, who would do anything to ensure we had something for breakfast and dinner everyday when I was in fourth year high school even if it’s just bread.

And so she would count every piece of peanuts if it meant we would have an extra peso for extra bread at night. With her, every cent counts, because it meant I would be able to buy one notebook at a time for the next school year. She had been doing the same thing for years.

To ensure I did have notebooks, my sister would make handmade Christmas cards practically every day of the year when I was in grade school. Come December, many students in our sleepy town in Laoang would buy them so they would have a card to exchange with their classmates during Christmas parties. Some of them ordered in advance and bought a few dozen just for 0.50c apiece. The demand was so high we won’t be able to accommodate every order.

Why she bothered buying me notebooks knowing I didn’t write in them was a mystery to me. Then again, maybe deep down she knew it made me happy, having brand new school stuff every year.

For each day she was with me meant that I won’t have to wash my clothes, clean the house, or cook. Being with her meant that my notebooks would have notes in it because she’d write those for me, do my assignments and draw my drawings for me, even cut my hair for me.

With her beside me meant that I won’t have to roast the peanuts or make the yema I sell to my classmates myself because she would do those for me, too.

My sister allowed me to do everything I wanted to do. She won’t scold me even if she knew I didn’t study every night, preferring to read novels instead. In spite of this, she would still do all these things for me.

She was that sister who would get up with me at five in the morning everyday during my senior year in high school to make sandwiches so we could sell them at my high school canteen.

My stingy sister who, even if we had barely enough money to spare for anything but food and rent, bought me snacks including chocolates for my admission test in UP. This, because she didn’t want me to go hungry in the middle of my exam.

She was not a risk-taker, she was a shy person, but my sister would do anything knowing it was for me. She was weak but she would take on anything and be my strength knowing she was doing it for me: do odd jobs for me, go hungry with me, suffer in silence with me, be brave for me. But most of all, she would let me do anything I like because she believed in me. Even if whatever it is that I want to do seemed hopeless and impossible at the moment.

Ate, I want to tell you that even after everything, especially after everything, that I have not forgotten my promises to you when we were younger. I will make them happen, even if it’s the last thing I do.

And I do not believe I have said the words ever so I’m saying them now.

In the flurry of things, in the middle of the muck that was our life, we didn’t say much, couldn’t say much. We’ve experienced so many things together—some of them way too traumatic and way too painful to write in here—that we do not, could not, discuss our thoughts and feelings.

But I feel your pain.

I feel your love.

Thank you. For everything. For sticking it out. I know I’ll never be able to say that enough.

I’m mighty proud for having you as my sister. Being your sister is an honor. I know there isn’t anyone like you in this world.

I love you.

Book Review: Coming Home by AJ Matt

Book Info:

Christmas is a time to gather and share with family. But some families are without the ones they love. Noah is one such person, raising Conner – his fiancé’s son – as they both wait for his return from his tour of duty. And there might just be a miracle for them this holiday season.

Genre: Romance, Contemporary romance, MM, MM romance, LGBT, short story.

Download this free short story in Goodreads!

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/19548105-coming-home

Coming Home by AJ Matt

About AJ Matt

AJ grew up on the east coast and developed a deep-seated love for snow. She’s into Genealogy and has traced three family surnames back to Germany; with British roots undiscovered and a fair possibility of Irish and Scottish ancestry. In her spare time, she can be found in the local library or behind a computer screen. AJ also loves all things fantasy-driven and enjoys a good mystery. She lives at home with her family.

Follow her on:

Twitter: @ajm_phoenix
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/7579111.A_J_Matt

My Review:

Coming Home is AJ Matt’s first published story.

I published this because I fell in love with it right after reading it for the first time.

It struck a chord deep in my heart. As the entire world know – typhoon Haiyan wreaked havoc in Central Philippines and indeed, most families there would be without some of their loved ones this Christmas.

In Coming Home, Noah’s little family just experienced a miracle this Christmas. May we all experience some form of miracle this season as we all try to cope with our own issues and struggles.

Congratulations to AJ Matt for having written such a heartwarming story. Looking forward to reading more of your works.

Happy reading and happy holidays, everyone! ^__^

Would also like to thank our editor, Via Blancia and our photographer Adrian Albano for such an awesome shot!

Rating: Five out of five stars. Recommended to everyone who loves heartwarming short reads.