Home

So I'll soon be going away for a few months to study - I won't ever have been away from home for such an extended stretch of time, and I'm worried about (a) hor fun/hae mee/bak kut teh deprivation and MSG withdrawal symptoms; (b) do I even remember how to study?!; (c) how will I function without my wife telling me where I'm supposed to be :D

Everyday, when I get back home from work, I ask my kids and wife "how's your day?".  Those simple three words make my family a family - we share our adventures, if we've had a tough day and are tired out, or if something cool has happened and we're excited, or sometimes just something inane - "Masterchef's new episode is out today!" or "Daddy, I gotta tell you how I got a team wipe in Dota!"  And at the end of the night, my wife and I give the kids a hug (I'm so glad I still get these now that they're both in their teens!), and we wrap up with "see you tomorrow!"

So going without a "see you tomorrow!" is gonna be no fun at all!

Don't get me wrong - I'm super grateful to have the chance to go away and do something different, if only for a while.  It's a cool thing to do.  But as I think about it, I'm even more grateful for something else, which is that I even have something to miss to begin with.  I actually have something precious here at home.

I'm glad my family is a place I love to come home to.  I'm glad my wife and I are going to miss each other so much, we're refusing to pack the luggage until the last minute because it will remind us that we'll be apart.  I'm glad my kids have been thinking, who's going to sit alongside me if I have questions when I'm preparing for my exams?  I'm glad my parents still think of their boy and bought a bunch of durians ahead of my departure!

Yesterday, I went for my usual bread distribution work at the rental flats.  One elderly lady who'd been a friend over the years was struggling with pain in her leg, so I made sure to pray for her before we left her home.  Since I wouldn't be seeing them for a while, so I told her that I'd be gone for the next couple of months, but that someone would still be coming around with the bread to see them.

It was really heart warming to see her reaction - she took my hand, earnestly and repeatedly told me to keep safe, and made me promise to come back to see her.  And I realised that in a different kind of way, I have a family here too, not only with the residents, but also with my friends and colleagues who volunteer their time with me, whether they are new or have been with us over all these years.  So if you are one of those people, thank you!  And if you want to be one of those people, call me! :D

It's at times like these that I am also reminded of how God looks at me, and indeed all of us, and yearns to show us what Home looks like.  In the parable of the prodigal son, the eponymous son insults his father, takes his inheritance and wastes it on wine, women and song.  In the depths of his misery, he decides to swallow his pride and return home after realising the error of his ways.  Rather than being castigated, he is welcomed home with open arms by his father, who throws a big party for him.  The prodigal son had learned to be grateful for Home, and the father was unconditionally joyful that the son he thought was lost was now Home with the Father.

Whatever glitter and glamour that the world may offer, and yes, I don't deny I am excited to do something different far away, there's really nothing like home, and all that it means.  I don't know if I have time to write another blog entry before I go off, but I wish all of you the blessing of having the diligence, good sense and gratitude to build, and where broken, rebuild the relationships that make up Home.  See you in a bit!

 Another aeroplane
Another sunny place
I'm lucky I know
But I wanna go home
Mmm, I got to go home
Michael Buble (2005)

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Life as a pie chart

Image
Someone told me recently about a "life exercise" in which one compiles all the stuff that makes up your life, and puts it in a pie chart.  So let's say for me, something like this. The idea is to visually demonstrate to myself that, in the event I lose one of these things, then I can see that, hey life is not so bad, that wasn't such a big deal.  Say for example, if I suffered a blown ACL, and couldn't run or play basketball any more, like this: At first blush - I'd say, hey, I still have my wife, children, parents, career, church life - so, chin up, things are not so bad.  Pretty good life visualisation tool to bring some optimism back into play! ... But what if, a month later, something happens at work, and boom, career gets sidetracked, I lose my job, or get put in cold storage somewhere, like this: Oops, now only half my life is left!  With only half of life's meaning left to me, what do I do? And what if something happens to
Read more

Bullying? Stand up!

Image
When I was a kid, I remember being bullied a fair bit.  I was small for my age, bespectacled, shy.    The teachers didn't help by putting a target on my back by making me Vice Head Prefect.  I would get my stuff just taken away from me by bigger kids, dragged out into the field to be tickled until I collapsed (much less fun than it sounds), and pushed into the storm drains.  Not all the kids were full-blown bullies of course.  But I remember some of them standing by, and politely holding my spectacles (so they wouldn't be broken) while the bullies did their work on me. Most of this stopped when I got to secondary school, where a much larger proportion of my fellow students were now just as nerdy!  And of course I grew up too.  I don't really look back on those days with any kind of animosity, because I think it never occurred to me that it was unusual.  But I do think my experience made me a bit more sympathetic about people around me who are being bullied. When you
Read more

Family AND Team

Image
I heard an interesting viewpoint this weekend. A family is not inherently a team. Hmm.  Sometimes at work, often in church, and most of the time at home, you hear people say to each other that we are family. And often, we really are. We care for each other above and beyond transactional matters.  It matters to me when my colleagues and cell group members (and of course my actual family members) go through illnesses or family issues or work challenges. I root for their success at presentations and projects and relationships. I care about what they care about, even if it has little direct impact on my own life. In a way, a family is sort of an amalgam of people who support each other in pursuit of each member's personal goals. For example, as a father, I support my children in their academic, career and ministry goals. But where they go to school, the grades they get, and the careers and ministries they build - they're really their goals, not mine.  Ditto for my role as a church
Read more