Perpisahan

Perpisahan, meski hanya sementara, selalu menyimpan duka. Terlebih saat perpisahan ini adalah final dan selamanya. Duka makin dalam ketika yang pergi adalah orang yang teramat dekat di hati kita.

Dan puncak perpisahan adalah kematian. Walau kita sadar bahwa semua kehidupan akan berakhir dengan kematian karena kehidupan dan kematian adalah bagian dari siklus kehidupan. Kita tidak akan pernah siap dengan perpisahan karena kematian, karena maut abadi terasa begitu mencekam.

Karena ekspektasi manusia lahir, dewasa, tua, dan wafat, saat kita kanak-kanak, kita memaklumi generasi kakek nenek kita meninggal. Saat kita beranjak dewasa, kita memaklumi generasi orang tua kita meninggal.  

Namun untuk beberapa orang, siklus kehidupan kadang berakhir singkat. Dan kita tidak akan pernah siap bila generasi anak-anak kita berpulang mendahului kita.  

Kemarin, kabar duka itu datang dari sahabat. Berupa pesan singkat. "James has passed away". Singkat tetapi mengejutkan. Karena 3 minggu sebelumnya, kita sempat makan malam bersama dengan keluarga mereka. Aku dan anak lanangku. 

Pun seminggu sebelumnya, sepupuku memberi kabar bahwa putranya sekelas dengan James. Dan siang sebelum berita duka itu datang, ayah James masih mengatur mini reuni karena ada teman kuliah yang pulang ke Indonesia. 

Mama James memakai istilah "we were caught off guard" dengan perginya James. And all of us got hit big time. 

Kesedihan dan air mata yang tertumpah pun seakan bukan hanya mengiringi James, tetapi juga banyak jiwa lain yang dying young. Dan rasa duka ini seakan tak pantas dirasakan dan orang tua James jauh lebih berhak. 

Tetapi saat Mama James menulis ini di WA: 

"In all religion we all know about "nothing last forever" in Budhism we call ANICCA...eventhough IT HIT ME SO HARD...I learn, accept and LET HIM GOO wih ALL MY LOVE🙏🏻🙇🏻♀" I know that everything is gonna be alright... 

Because to LOVE is to LET GO... 

Selamat jalan, James, doa dan cinta kami mengiringi... and remember... YOU ARE LOVED... ALWAYS.. 

Cibubur - Jakarta - Surabaya 

23-25 Juli 2018

Empty Nest and the Two of Us

Time passes by so fast while heart changing so slowly...

Senin kemarin, gue officially a Mom of 2 high schoolers and 1 middle schooler. It seems that it was just only yesterday I was carrying my pregnant tummy.

Kemarin sempat baca artikel yg di share Cindy Kristanto Rustandi that echoes her anxiety of being left by their children to college. And it means for me, the time will come too, pretty soon.

Meanwhile, I still have sometime to spend with them under my wings (okay, okay...  I admit it was more gelambir lemak than wings).

But tonight Jo went to sleep at school for orientation. And Adel also stayed overnight being new student committee member. 2 kids gone. And the house feels so empty. No wonder they called it empty nest... with much emptyness...

And Greg too, although showing up to check on me every once in a while, the frequency has decreased much since he tried to behave like a big kid.

We are too absorbed and engrossed in taking care of our kids growing up, that we forgot what it was like not being a parents.

We often threw joke that we're too old for clubbing, midnight movieing, going to concert, while we just try to reason and makes excuses of our inability to leave the kids on their own. Or may be it's our need to get more sleep.

After we have kids (and the baby blues passed), we found that everything is better with the kids around. And realizing that one by one will fly away from us is a scary thought.

May be this is a good time to rethink and reshape what we are before we are parents, what we can do without the kids.

It's not to late, is it?