“Pasok na!!! Mahamog na!!!”

This was what my eldest brother and I heard after a long day of playing outside on our yard.  My mother would be yelling on the top her lungs to let us know that dinner is ready and we better come inside or else sisipunin kami (or else we’ll get a cold).  If that threat didn’t work, she’d tell us that the kapre would get us.  Then I start thinking of the manananggal.. But that’s a different story.

These thoughts were in my head the other night because my husband and I were sharing stories of our childhood.  Talking about the differences of how we grew up and the differences of how the next generation is growing up. I told him that one of my mother’s problems with me and eldest brother was that we were underweight.  It was only then that I realized that it was the running around, climbing trees and playing on the streets that made us stick thin (my youngest brother still has that problem).  Don’t get me wrong, we stuffed our faces with food whenever we got the chance.  I would even have spoonfuls and spoonfuls of brown cow or condensed milk before dinner.

I always thought that I had the best childhood and I still think the same now that I’m 28 years old.  Even if we didn’t have all the toys in the world, we were happy with the fruit trees that surrounded our house,  the neighbor kids who played with us,  And the shower head that my dad randomly set-up on our front yard.  We didn’t have a swimming pool, but we got to run around soaked with water from that shower head.  We just ran around, played so many games with just what we had on our yard. It was the best hot days of my childhood years.

Now that my husband and I are thinking about kids, I can’t help but wonder how they’re going to grow up.  Life was so simple back in the day. There were no internet, Facebook, x-boxes, Wiis and even cellphones.  I can’t help but wonder if our kids will grow up to have a simple uncomplicated life without technology.

We’ll see where this story goes.  All I know is that we’re going to try to raise the kids as best we know by God’s grace, and with friends who have been there and done that.  Away from all the distractions in our current world –  No video games!

Me, mother, eldest brother and my younger brother. Youngest brother missing from this photo.

This photo was taken at Club Filipino for some family reunion. I tried to look for photos of me and my brothers playing in the sun, but then I realized my mother would never take a photo of us covered with dirt.  So that’s the best I could do.

That night, when I was talking to Nick about our childhood.  I fell asleep with my thoughts a million miles and years away.  With the sun on my shoulders, laughing and running with my brother, eating Rinbee and climbing the star apple tree.  I slept good that night as if I played under the sun the whole day.