Dear Dad

I can't believe a decade has passed, almost half of my life spent without you. As a kid, I thought it would've been impossible to survive without one's dad or mom but I'm about to graduate now and maybe even enter med school. We used to dream about that together didn't we? Well a lot of our dreams have come true Dad, and a lot of them still waiting to happen.

"We may never, never meet again
On on the bumpy road to love.
Still I'll always, always keep the memory of

The way you hold your knife;
The way we danced 'til three;
...The way you've changed my life.
No, no, they can't take that away from me."

Remember that? I always think of you when I play this song. No one really ever plays these old songs anymore. Which is perfect because I wouldn't know how to react if they did. I might tear up with the thought of us and Raj singing this on our way to school. Those breakfast meals at McDonalds with hot chocolates! Raji with the pancakes, me with longganisa and egg and you with your good old cup of coffee.

I wish I can give you another heart-shaped kiss on the cheek and tell you that I love you and that I miss you and that I still think of you every single day. I've stopped wondering how my life would've been like if you were still around because hey, I've come this far already. A few years back, I'd still daydream that you were just stuck in some deserted island waiting to be found and that you'd come knocking at our door one day. Or that maybe I'd find a bunch of letters that you wrote just before you died so that me and my brothers would still know how to live our lives without you. And although those fantasies have died down already, the pain still remains. I've never really gotten around the fact that you're gone and that you're never coming back.

But hey, we're okay. And I hope you are too wherever you are. I drink beer now by the way and I don't even mind the taste of Pale Pilsen anymore, which I realize is the smell I remember you most by. Well, aside from your perfume and the smell of car freshener. So tonight, I'll be raising a toast for you and for the amazing person that you are. Death can only do so much to a man who's full of love, dreams and hopes. Death can never take those away from you nor from us who are still here, touched by your kindness and courage. How can we give up on life when it was you who gave it to us, who taught us how to live it and how to love it? We will never ever forget that. We will never ever forget you.

I love you so much Daddy! I'll always be your Baby Girl. :-)