It’s 4 am, the taxi is waiting outside.
Dad is now loading it with our luggages. He came back with the taxi after he left to find one an hour ago. I’m pretty sure he pulled an all-nighter watching all the Rocky Balboa movies.
I just finished doing my hair and my younger sister’s hair and putting on the clothes I laid out last night. Black work slacks, a shirt and a white cardigan over it. They said we had to be dressed “business casual”, for some reason.
Now I quietly kneel on the floor, where my 3 year old sister is sound asleep. I have to wake her up to change her. But she’s so peaceful…Oops, now she’s up. Hey, there.
Is this the last time I get to change her clothes for a while? You don’t know what’s going on, do you? Tomorrow Ate Kaye won’t be here when you wake up. But, how long is “a while”?
There’s a knot in my chest I’ve been trying to ignore for days leading up to today. I just can’t go there. Nope, won’t let myself.
Wishing for Time to Slow Down
The next few moments are a blur. We are now riding in the taxi. It’s still dark out, the world sleeping.
We get out of the taxi, dad now pulling our luggages as I walk to his left toward the airport entrance.
He jokes that I am getting taller than him. I think I chuckle for him but keep my eyes forward.
Now we are all just inside the entrance. It’s all a blur but we say our goodbyes. I don’t remember it though, I think I’m trying not to cry.
This building is so busy…
Holding my luggage, I turn around. I didn’t realize daddy and baby sis stepped out already. They’re looking at us through the glass windows.
Dad has her in his arm, they’re both waving. My little sister looks so sleepy and confused I try not to laugh. I wave back. I gaze a moment longer to memorize what they look like.
Daddy wearing his tan “CAT” baseball cap, his maroon button down long-sleeve shirt that has the sleeves folded up. Little sis wearing her yellow top and denim skort. Of course I remember; I picked it out and changed her into it myself earlier.
I’ll see you again in a few months!
This plane is huge. Wait how did we get on so fast? All four of us are sitting in a row in the middle of the aisle. Oh my gosh, the flight stewardess is American. I’ve never seen blonde hair in real life, whoa!
I pull out my little diary, the one with the lock. I’m going to document everything here.
I pour words out onto this page. Satisfied, I lock it back up and stow it, and fall asleep with a heavy chest and a lump in my throat as the plane takes off.
A One-Way Flight
In June 2007, I got on a plane with my mom and two sisters, leaving our home, the Philippines, towards a better life waiting for us in America.
I was 15 years old. We had to take the last year off of school, because we got word that our visa application was finally in motion. So we spent the next year waiting for phone calls, commuting back and forth to the US embassy and other government offices.
We never got involved in adult conversations; we were just told that the plan was for me and my two sisters to go with my mom first so we could start school immediately, and our youngest sister who was a toddler would stay behind with our dad.
That my mom would work on their papers right away, and in three months they would join us and we would all be together again.
Three months was nothing! It would go by fast. Was what I kept telling myself.
A Close Bond
In hindsight, I’m angry. It was selfish to leave my sister behind, if both parents knew it would take longer than 3 months.
I love my family, don’t get me wrong, but we also weren’t perfect. I wasn’t privy to my parents having problems for years. So I’m angry that grown adults would agree to leave a child behind for whatever reason they had.
I’m close to all my sisters, but I feel that I formed a stronger bond with my youngest sister for having taken care of her since she was born, more than my other siblings.
I was a middle child for twelve years before she came along, so naturally I did middle child things. Much to my resentment, all the nasty house chores fell on me.
So did helping take care of a newborn.
I remember being the one to wake up in the middle of the night when she cried to make her a bottle and feed her, so everyone else can keep sleeping. Most of the time it was because no one else would, and for some reason everyone else felt it was my job. I had to get up while everyone covered their ears and continued to sleep.
I was 12.
From 12 years old until I was 15, I was pretty much her main babysitter. I was also a child myself though, so naturally I grumbled too. I wasn’t always happy about it.
But that also meant she was closer to me.
Leaving her and my dad created a hole in my heart that will never be filled again. I was close to my dad; I often referred to myself as his sidekick.
He wasn’t perfect, no, but he was my hero. He could do anything in my eyes. I remember when I was 14 (I’m pretty sure this is in my journal somewhere), I set the standards right then for who I would marry. He had to be like my dad.
But the most painful part of this whole thing was leaving my sister.
I didn’t know how to deal with this pain.
When I left, I stuffed down every emotion that tried to rise. I felt her fears then: waking up at night wondering where I was. Where mom was. Where we all were. Why was she left behind? When were they coming back?
I didn’t want to feel it anymore; I felt so helpless. There was nothing I could do. All I did was wonder why. Why did it have to be this way?
I kept telling myself it would only be three months, that she probably won’t even remember it, that we would be together again before we knew it.
It was eight years until I saw her again.
I have so many regrets over the years. Why hadn’t I asked questions? Why hadn’t I prodded and pushed and annoyed the heck out of everyone to tell us what the status was of the visa application? Was there even an application?
I let myself get caught up in the dramas of teenage life. I felt like I had enough on my plate that I was also navigating myself.
Instead, it took my dad passing away in 2014 for us to start doing anything. My mom then went back to the Philippines and stayed with my sister for a year until her papers were squared away, and she finally joined us in America in 2015.
I have no idea what kind of pain my mom had to go through to have to leave her youngest child behind and not see her for years. That would have taken a whole lot of courage, because as a mother now myself, I can’t imagine it.
She did well masking it, for sure.
Making Up, Wish-I-Coulds
My sister is all grown now, and despite the years we missed, we are working on reconnecting together.
What she had to go through, the life she had to live for 7 years without her mom, without her sisters, I can’t believe we put her through that. It was all so messed up.
I’m grateful she had the chance to grow up with our dad, but I also can’t help but be mad that she (both of them) could have lived a better life with us. We could have all been adjusting to a new life together.
If I could turn back the time, I would. If I could see that little 3-year-old again, I would fight like hell for her, to spare her from the impoverished life she was about to endure for 7 years. Cushion her from witnessing our dad pass away. I would give everything for her to grow up with me, with her sisters, and mother and father, to be surrounded by love from the rest of her family.
Not through pictures. Not through the twice a year phone calls.
Here.
I would have gladly taken her place.
The hardest separation I’ve ever had to go through was separation from my little sister. The most painful part of it was I did nothing for years, and I wish I could undo it all.
