If there's one thing I learned about time, it will be the ebb and flow of life. Although winter was not as hard this year, my spring is momentarily greeted again by bouts of summer souvenirs. Some posts ago, I was being pensive about finding home but these days, it almost feels like one. A premature summer lunch at Cathy's terrace.It is so amazing how a simple detail of our everyday routine can actually make us fly back to a certain memory, or more to a particular feeling. And being transplanted literally means to temporarily put aside habits along that isolated part of your past life. To form new ones & embrace change. But somehow we inertly revert to old habits, only in a new environement, assuring us of that somewhat sense of belongingness.
I still sometimes wake up in awe, asking myself if I am really here in France. But there are moments before going to sleep, when the music from our room's clock-radio brings me back to my childhood room. The soft rain these days remind me of bed-weathers. Scooters of our barrio's kids roaring like tricycles. The car's open windows in the highway like those many roadtrips back home. Summer will always be my favorite season.
And who would have thought that our little barrio will have a total of
four Filipinas? Two here in Carry & the other two in our neighboring barrio, Ensues la Redonne. Even if Cathy was already living in Carry for 3 years & 6 for me, we only met last year, doing different paths & meeting through Malou. As early as March, we have been speaking about barbeques & picnics at the beach. Having them around is such a comfort. Great grocery shopping at the Asian store, great meals & even after a hefty Filipino meal, we always end up speaking about food. There's really something about Filipinos & food, and the conversation that goes around with it. With Malou, Cathy & Lani at Malou's.So it also means tennis. Cathy & I played for 40 minutes, 20 minutes each under a scorching hot 2pm sun. It felt so good & I could have sworn that if there weren't so many pine trees around the tennis court, I could be back home in our village. But after 6 years of not playing, a year of hyperthyroid medications & yes, of getting old, I ended up on the couch all pale, chilling cold for a damn 40 minutes of tennis. But did it feel good & I already bought a tennis racquet finally. That was important for me.
The ebb & flow of life. Time is an absolute everything. In time, the time I have here will slowly become like the time I had back home, reforming habits of summers so familiar.
