[ 1 0 ] 8-Strange Deliverance

expectations seem to always be shattered

I opened my Hotmail inbox like I usually would because it said:

Inbox (4)
Junk Mail (5)

A statistic which signals the need to open it. I carefully scanned the all the mails in the Inbox and dismissed them as misplaced Junk mails. Then, I switched into the Junk Mail folder in hope for a quick ending of this timeless routine. Looking at Junk Mails - a move I don't usually perform - I see a familiar name at the "From" column: Teo XXXX XXXX.

It had the same last name as I did. It held the family name. It was my father.

Someone I vaguely remember as an authorative figure. A well-hated tower once but now diminished to a passing shadow. He was never there. Not then, not now. Except now he is both physically and psychologically absent. Ironically, I more vividly recall the brand I once used on him, 'omniabsent'.

The mail was simple, it had no "Dear son" or any hint of a greeting. My eyes yearned for a body of text but it wasn't there. What I found was an even simpler company signature with his name. No position of him in the company. No detail of his occupation. No links. No disclaimers. Just his name, the company and a fax number.

As if instinctively, I read the subject of the mail again. It was clear and plain, saying, "for sons & daughters." I didn't find my email on the to line. Instead it gave less than mystery:

But wait, there was an attachment.

I saw it. It looks like a chain mail but my dad wasn't one who's fond of such worldly affairs. To you, perhaps with a nice enough family, it could touch your heart. Yet, that part of my heart had long been frozen. Neither the music nor the content could thaw it. It was never warm there, I have forgotten how being warm was like.

That name, I've nearly forgotten. That love, I've never experienced.

A mail like that did nothing. It is worse off than that zephyr that carassed my skin. Still, that room is empty. Could more do? Take me back to 1988, the moment I was first here. Perhaps if I saw that gleam on his face, I would reciprocate easier.

That memory would too easily be overwritten by the sufferings of mum I saw. The undeserved silence she had to observe. The pains I took from the breather he took. I have too, forgotten when the word mother had the meaning of father imbued onto.

Perhaps I too am "Hotmail" who never recognised that email address and sent it into the Junk Mail folder.


As I learnt to speak, you forgot how to do so; you taught me to love by not loving.