Until this year, I was a full-time OFW the past thirteen years.
Blessed with a generous employer and a short-distance flight travel from my work-site, my family has the privileged to visit Philippines at least once a year. It was always an occasion we looked forward to – a long break from my everyday work, my wife catching up with friends and relatives, my children being able to enjoy their play-time with cousins and friends who finally spoke the same mother tongue. And did I forget to say about Pinoy foods, and more mouth-watering Pinoy foods, and more mouth-watering tempting Pinoy foods, all to our tummy’s delight? Admittedly, diet and weight gain are non-existing vocabularies during those 3-week stay-cations.
In all those years, a simple welcome tradition was started by my parents. Whether it be a simple pentel-marked A4 paper, or a hurriedly pen-scribbled message on a brown Manila paper or in a large cartolina with our nephews and nieces writing their greetings, they would always write their “Welcome Home” greetings for us. They would hang it, make it stand, paste it or tie around any post just to make sure it would be the first thing we would see when we arrive the house. Anybody could easily dismiss the haphazard outlook of those welcome greetings but the truth is, the heart-warming message always leave a love-mark in us.
We are entering the Advent season wherein the Lord is coming again on Christmas day. So how are you and I so far in the preparation stages for His arrival? Hopefully, the top-most in our to-do-list will not be about early discount shopping for gifts, or extravagant decoration-motifs of the humongous and glittering Christmas trees we have, or the sumptuous Noche Buena feast we are planning to serve to our loved ones. Neither the beautiful clothes nor the latest shiny pair of shoes during the Simbang gabi series or Sunday mass count as well. Don’t get me wrong. These stuffs are OK in making good outwardly preparations. However, we must focus on and prioritize what is really essential.
When our Lord celebrant arrives, what He would certainly like to see, is the simple yet humble, happy and hopeful welcome message we will put in front of us, in the open doorsteps of our hearts.
“Welcome Home and Stay In Us, Lord.”
Mas warm yan kesa sa mga kumukutikutitap.
Kaya tara na po para ihanda ang ating mga puso.
Padating na siya.
God bless po.
