Christmas 2023

December 26, 2023, 9:22 AM PH Time

December 25, 2023, 5:22 PM Pacific Time

This is the setup I dread - being a remote observer of an activity happening on a different place. They do their Christmas party games and eat their food while I slouch in front of my laptop and eat my own spaghetti and toasted bread. I can hear them all, thanks to microphones, but I know only Mom or Dad hears me and sees me - whoever is holding the phone.

At least I get to join in Bingo - I shade my virtual card in my phone as Tito Dem calls out the numbers. I want to raise my hand and answer in Charades, but I quickly think of the hardware limitations - my voice only comes out through the phone speakers; it's not loud enough to steal the point, unless Dad echoes my answer (I'm in the same group as Dad, so yes, teamwork).

My heart breaks that the best thing we can do to let me in on the family party is through a phone and a screen. I can't touch them, hug them, do high fives with my cousins...I want to be 7,000 miles away from where I am now, sit in any of the couches in that same living room with Mom and Dad, Tito and Tita, cousins. I want to include myself in the boat as is sinks, or so the game master says. The physical barrier just...i just can't.

In the midst of this...I look unto Jesus and He grants me the will to give thanks. I am grateful that there's a big family out there thinking about me, who remembers Kuya and me on Christmas Day, who wants to include us in special moments in whatever way possible. It's just crazy that they want me to join the games. In some games the setup works, in some games not. I know for lots of years now they've been praying that Kuya and I get to spend Christmas with them in the US soon, and even if it's not yet this year (Lord I humbly ask, please grant this prayer of ours according to Your good and perfect will...), I thank God just for this simple truth that people are praying for us. And it already means a lot to me.

Life consists of the physical, but its entirety cannot be contained in just the physical. There are thoughts, memories, emotions, souls that God allows to meet with each other, to happen, to share existence with. And that makes life meaningful - Jesus is the Artist, and people are the different pens He uses to draw something out of the blank canvas that is me.

I guess this is me just feeling things, just amplifying things. I mean I didn't cry. But I... Maybe I just wanted to make sense of my thoughts so I wrote them down because this one I didn't want to throw in the backburner, where most of them go.