It’s a Sunday evening, & my mother has been dead for two weeks, 1 day. I can’t believe that time has seemly sped up again. From the time I officially heard from my dad she passed, ’til the time we left to come back to Montréal, time seemed to stand still. What would feel like hours would only be minutes. Now time seems to be back at that steady where-did-the-week-go pace as we slowly fall into life’s normal routine again.

I look at the pile of envelopes on the floor. About 10 first class air mail envelopes, all addressed all over the world, but mostly going to family in the Philippines. I can’t help but think this is where it all began, some 36+ years ago. A letter in an envelope just like this starting the friendship & then the romance that would become my parent’s marriage after three years of correspondence across the world. Now, these letters sit here with the terrible news that she is no longer with us in body. I found this handful of addresses from relatives and it is the only way we can get word to them. I hate that it has taken me two weeks to sit down and write them. When my grandmother died in 2003, my mother got the news 6 weeks after her passing. It appears that this will be the same timing.

I am also filled with hope that this correspondence will help me get to know the family I do not know. I am lucky to be surrounded by the support of family on my father’s side but I have always had a longing to know the other side.

It has been a touch & go weekend for me emotionally. It doesn’t help that it has rained every Saturday since my mother’s passing. It is the little things that draw me to sadness. Like seeing her favourite treats at the Asian grocery store or hearing her favourite hymn at Mass today. Yet, I dream of her & that is very comforting. She is already sending me messages that way. But sometimes I wake from dreams and think, it was just a dream right? She is still here…

Yet, she is still here. I merely have to ask for her guidance, and I get it. The process, continues…