That cemetery is home 


By Johanne Margarette R. Macob 
 
 


 

ALMOST a decade ago and the years before that, the cemetery was a strange place for me, even on all souls’. I wasn’t used to visiting any relatives’ tombs even my grandpas and grandmas’ (as I found the idea awkward since I didn’t really know them).

Our town’s cemetery was a year-round off-the-wall territory for me. It was…until my father’s demise.

I’ve been regularly visiting the cemetery, for nine years now.

At least four times in a year, my family would go to Papa’s new place- on his birthday, on Father’s Day, on All Souls’ Day (or all saints’), on Christmas. Individually, we visit his grave on random times. Sooner than later, it felt as if the cemetery-which I used to dislike- has turned into an extension home for me, for our family, simply because a member of the family “lives” there.

That cemetery has been a regular “hangout place” for our family since I was 12. I wasn’t comfortable initially why we had to go there when we don’t really see him. All I knew was it’s the place where we last saw my father’s slim-jim physique. It’s where his physical body lies.

Now that the numbers in my age have already switched places, I have fully understood why we and other people would continuously go to cemeteries, despite the distance. The visits stopped being a rude interference in our daiy activities because that cemetery is now home.

That place where our family is, it is a home. So I guess it is more than just culture and tradition that we visit cemeteries, but the genuine significance of such.

We like – more anything else- to be with our loved-ones in all ways possible. We love the idea of being able to eat with them, talk to them, laugh with them, or even cry with them again- even once in a while- in a manner that only we can possibly understand how. We have that endless desire to feel so at home.

I realized then that home isn’t really something physical, it’s more like faith, and hope, and love. It’s very subjective. It’s not built on cements or steels or woods, but of trust and of unconditional affection. Thus it can never be broken. It’s endless. It can be found anywhere. It’s where your comfort lies. It’s moving. It soothes you, it makes you be who you are, and it inspires you to be what you have yet to become. As for my case, and perhaps somebody else’s, my home is wherever my family is.

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