Dear Wafa...

Thirty Two

Dear Wafa,

It has been 19 years since I last saw you or heard your voice. To think that I have lived 19 years of my life without hearing back from you! At least some of the decisions I have made in these years would have been different if you were around.

But Wafu, I had no idea that thinking of you after so many years would still make me cry. Of course, on that fateful day, I had felt like my world had ended and that all colour had dropped out of life. I thought I would never be happy again. And it was justified, as yours was the first personal loss that I had encountered. You were my first friend, best friend, and pretty much a part of me. To lose you at the tender age when one steps into adolescence was to lose a part of myself, perhaps the part that I liked the most. But life moved on, like a river that flows for the most part steadily, gently yet surely forward, and at times gushes forth hastily, violently, heedless of who gets on or off its path. I graduated, got married, had kids, joined for PhD... on and on, we tread until our days on this planet are over.

But the fact that I have moved on doesn't mean that I have forgotten you. I still can't talk about you without feeling a lump in my throat. I hold on to the memories of your last year because that was when we spent quality time with each other. I am not moping around all the time but when I think of you, my eyes well up even today.

And you know what, Wafu, this world is so unfair that sometimes it's so upsetting to be alive and well in a world where some people barely survive. I feel devastated by the atrocities that unfold before my eyes. For the past nine months, many of us have been experiencing a myriad of emotions ranging from outrage, despair and helplessness to grief and a deep, deep sadness that slowly eats our insides.  Having lost a friend, I can only imagine how the children will overcome the trauma of losing their whole family and friends, (and homes and schools) all at once.

For I still remember vividly that around 6 a.m. on this day 19 years ago, I got the biggest shock of my life. It was a Wednesday and I was doing maths homework when my father gently broke the news to me. I continued with my homework until he closed my book and told me that there will be no school that day. I did cry, but not right then. After the shock wore off, perhaps. I remember all the little details of that day. And every July, as rain pounds angrily on our roofs, I can't help but be thirteen again, mourning your loss all over again.

Love,
Nasoo.