Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official position of Boiling Waters PH.
I recall every bit of it:
Every tear drop. Every desperate cry.
Every cutting attempt. Every lie that defined my being.
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The bitterness that no one and nothing can sugarcoat.
The hatred I felt towards every cheerful person I met.
The grief and the pain I held onto to keep going.
The cursing, the murders and the revenge my mind have lingered on.
The disbelief that there could be that actual someone who can save me from this pit.
“I’m tired of it, I’m tired of never being enough. This life is a waste“, I told myself.
Then you came along.
You knocked on the door, asking if there was running water inside my room.
I said “yes, there’s nothing wrong with mine.” You smiled, and you left.
It was that moment that I found myself half-smiling again.
I still don’t know what it could have been.
Maybe your warmth, your smile, your grace.
Your familiar scent, your gentle voice, maybe?
Hearts day came and all these cheerful faces surrounded me…
in a foreign world where I felt the most solitude.
It was that day that I cursed every couple…
that I wanted to ruin anything that made them smile..
just like the grinch during Christmas.
“How selfish of them to smile when I’m stuck in this quicksand..
when I can’t even find my way out, when I can’t even pull myself up.”
And then, there was you, knocking on my door again.
“Come, join me. Let’s take a walk around the city“, you uttered.
To my surprise, you were able to convince me to go,
even if I don’t even feel like getting out of bed that day.
(To date, I still don’t know my whys and hows.)
There we were, walking around the city, talking nonsense from dawn till dusk:
Talking just about anything I hated, things that irritated me, these cheesy things everyone was doing that I just could not bare.
And there you were, patiently listening to each rant, with no judgment.
You were just there, sitting still, making me feel a little more comfortable
to talk with some random stranger who kept knocking on my door.
Days turned to weeks. Weeks turned to months.
It was not long enough till you finally reached the deepest cuts of mine.
The darkest, scariest part of me that no one ever wanted to see.
Despite knowing the risks of detonating me would also cause a great damage to you, it seemed that it was least of your concerns.
All that mattered to you was your desire to see these entangled wires and to finally cut them off to set me free from being a hostage of my past.
“You will give up too, I know, but thank you for trying.”, I told myself.
It was not easy, I know.
It took so much attempts to cut them off, but none seemed to work.
There were days when I seemed to get better when I’m with you…
but when all the adrenaline runs out, I would always choose to go back to my old self.
The dark, the comfortable.
The kind of environment that I’m used to..that place where nobody can reach me.
There were times that you’d give up too.
There were times when you stopped reaching out to me, too.
But days, weeks, months have passed, and yet, you didn’t really let go.
There would be days when you would be gone for a few days,
and you’d be back again like nothing happened..and you’ll try one more time.
You stayed with me. You fought for me. You fought these lies in me.
You took a chance of loving me, even if I always pushed you away.
It was that day in spring when you took me to your home,
the day you introduced me to your brothers and sisters.
And there I was, sitting at a corner, never wanting to be noticed.
I hated everyone. I hated how everyone smiled at me.
“I’m disgusted with how pretentious they all are,
fronting like they’re happy but they’re really not”, my mind said.
It was the time that your father started to speak,
and for some reason, it broke my stone cold heart to its very core.
It only took a few words to rattle my heart, and to loosen this small chip
that you’ve been carefully peeling off from my heart all this time.
“Get up, and walk. You do not need to live in despair.
You do not have to stay in the dark.
Come with me, and I will lead you…
just take one more step towards me”.
His voice was like that familiar tone that I’ve known all along.
It was warm, gentle, peaceful, loving..it was both familiar and new;
It was simply unexplainable.
“It’s ok to be tired. It’s ok to be imperfect.
It’s ok to just be yourself. It’s ok to hurt.
It’s ok to cry. It’s ok to run away.”
Tears flooded my eyes a bit more after hearing each word.
I just couldn’t keep the tears from falling.
It felt like you were crushing my heart with every word.
You were crushing my calloused heart to make it beat again.
Then, I felt these arms surrounding me, comforting me.
But the moment I opened my eyes, there was nobody beside me.
It was an encounter, an experience that only you and I know.
It was not long enough that we had a life-changing argument:
“I’m not special. I know you will get tired of me too.”
“I will never turn my back away from you. I am never like them.”
“I will just continue to fail you. You will also get tired of loving me.”
I will never leave you, nor forsake you.
Nothing can keep me from extending my grace and love to you.”
“I am never good enough. I don’t have anything special to make you proud.”
“This world will only love and accept you if you fit their standards,
BUT I have always loved you with an everlasting, unconditional love.”
Desperate of cutting the discussion…
“Lord, why me? I am not worthy to be your child anymore.
You should just allow me to rot and to be thrown into the fire.”
“It’s never too late to start a new beginning with me, my child.
Come, take this journey with me. It will never be dull again.
It will never be meaningless again. It will always be more exciting.”
“But what if I stumble again?”
“It won’t matter. I’ll pick you up over and over again.”
“What if I turn my back from you again?”
“I will never give up on you. I will never run out of love for you.”
“What should I do, Lord? How and where should I start?”
“I have perfectly laid out everything for you, little one.
Just hold my hand and stay with me.”
And then I realized that this emptiness I have been feeling
was because of searching for love, acceptance and security in all the wrong places.
In a world full of lies, disbelief and temporal things,
how could I have forgotten that there was you all along?
Looking back, you didn’t really ask me if there was water in my room…
You were pertaining to the room in my heart, if I had running water flowing in me.
No. It was all drought and famine. It was dark, lifeless.
It was only when You came along that everyday seemed to be spring time:
Growing abundantly in Your love and favor..with running water flowing abundantly.
It’s been 3 years from that day.
A lot has changed. A lot has happened.
A lot has come. A lot has gone.
But these years only made me stronger in You.
And now, even when I face the roads of uncertainty,
even if I do not know what lies ahead,
I know that each day with you will always be a day in paradise,
and I would never trade this joy with anything else.
If it weren’t for that day, if it weren’t for that warrior who knocked on my door twice, then I would have been stuck in my own world in despair, grief and solitude.
But most of all, I would not have met you, Lord.
And I will always be grateful for that day that I opened the door.
