NO PERMANENT ADDRESS

Home Sweet Home by Gemini-Soul

“I can’t believe it,” My mom starts, “It’s been 3 years since we moved to the apartment. And we’re actually living in Metro Manila. Who actually knew about that?”

Well, yeah. It’s been 3 years and time would just pass by so fast that when you notice it, you’ll realize how much has happened even though you complain that nothing has ever happened and everything was harsh.

I. We are movers.

I have to admit, I really have no place to call my permanent house with my permanent room, a permanent kitchen, dining or living room, and a permanent address. For all my life, I have been exposed to moving after 3-4 years or maybe with another extra year. We didn’t intend it to be that way, I just noticed that somehow we couldn’t stay long at a place like all my friends and their families are.

I’ve frequently moved from place to place as far as I could remember; from my grandparent’s place, to a small underground home, to my grandmama’s house, to Cagayan De Oro: where we moved three times before settling at a concrete house with 2 rooms. Then moved back again to my grandparent’s place in Bohol and then had a real house with legal papers that implied my mother’s ownership on it. I was High School when I felt the comforts of a real home.

But High School is just 4 years and after which you have to go to college somewhere far off. And so I prepared for it. We first picked out a dorm in Cebu where I would have studied for college. But then, I landed at my Aunt’s house in Paranaque a few weeks later. I had agreed to study at a nearby University and live with their family. It was my official breakaway from a parent to live with a different kind of parent/guardian. I took 2 rides from home to school (which was UPHR, Las Pinas) everyday during my 1st year and 2nd year. Eventually, I started having issues at our home in Paranaque, so I went to look for an apartment. Thereby, after 3 years… I am still living in the same one that I found at my time of desperate need. Back then, my mom didn’t agree that I wanted to live alone. So she resigned at the university she was teaching for a long while at in Bohol to be with me here in our apartment in Las Pinas.

II. Unimaginable strength

What is hard about moving around places is  the fact that we are only two in the family, me and my mom. You could just imagine how many times we’ve carried heavy stuff  or go to the great ordeal of transporting one heavy object to the new place and then going back to get the others by ourselves. Sometimes we hire movers if we have the finances to support that. Yet  there was one particular move that we had no money to hire movers. That was when we transferred to Cagayan De Oro.

In my part, it is awkward to do this more than any normal child could do. There’s that gnawing feeling when your friends see you moving a lot. It would create a connotation of some sort about your family and your upbringing. But I never actually complained about this. Not now, not ever.

I know, in a few months or maybe within the next year, we’ll be moving again. In the long run, when I will settle for a place my own I’d make sure I’ll really settle in. But I’m open to change. Some time in that future, we’ll move again but this time when people are ready.

III. Greater Outcomes

What was interesting about moving to places is that I never miss school or felt that I had no friends at all just because I was new. I was able to have friends and undergo my childhood in some kind of broken scheme that came out with a very strong outcome. My personality was flexible and adaptable. Moving to places gave me more insight to the surrounding I had.

The last interesting thing about moving around and having a no permanent address is that when mom and I talk about the people and the experiences we had, there are tons of stories we remind each other and tell again and again. Without mathematical estimation or sort, a mover’s story is a lot better than those who have always had permanent addresses their whole lives.

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~ by MichAn on August 24, 2009.