Days

How long has it been since I first visited Makati as a law student? That time when I looked at this city with a sense of awe, like a mountain whose grandeur I am challenged to conquer. How long ago has it been since I was being constantly lost in the labyrinthine design of Glorietta? That time when, eating for the first time at TGI Fridays with my brother, I didn’t even know how to appreciate food the way all of us should.

Everything then was just part of a large whirling world where particulars dissolved into the bigger haze of the wider picture.

But not anymore.

Many things have already changed. Many events have already taken place. Major experiences have shaped the person I am now. Minor ones have defined who I have always been. Indeed, this is a time when, looking back at my lost youth, I appreciate the beauty before me, keeping in mind the wonder I have always had the first time I beheld them. Yes, I have matured. But I have never forgotten.

Not yet, at least.

More and more each day, as that clock ticks my life away, as I ask the questions of how long it has been, I am moving into the realm of adulthood where slowly, subtly, I leave that era of my life where everything is as carefree as birds in the wild. This time, that adorable innocence is being replaced by the fierce convalescence of a long dormant falcon in me. As I get ready to soar in this world, I leave behind the nest that was home for many of my childhood memories, that nest that will inevitably succumb to the powers of the wind, and then will eventually disappear. And be gone. Forever.

I am afraid of that day. I am scared of losing ground in this groundless world. I am frightened of that time when I will no longer ask, for I can no longer remember to ask, how long it has been since I first visited Makati, since I first experienced the wonders of a new city, the grandeur of an unknown mountain, and the innocence of a long forgotten youth.

I am afraid of that day…

…a day that will surely come.