Where the one ends, where the other begins?

“Everyone and everything is interconnected in this universe.” - Jeff

We were on our way back to the city. They were belting out to songs coming from my friend's MP3 player, a biographical collection of her life. There were songs I remember fondly, from our times together in school and the forest.

They made me think of the weekend. They made me think of the surreal, but memorable trip I had up north.

My friend's mom has cancer, and I wish I could give the world for her. 

There were fragments of memories of her in my life for as long as I had known my friend; him talking on the phone to her as her endearing abang chik, him berating us over the way we cook because they are never like his mom's, him telling us early in our friendship how he showed her a photo of us. 

For us, the trip was for her. For my friend, the trip was an attempt of fitting us in his shoes.

From showing us his playground, to his normal weekend jaunt at the harbour haggling for fish, to him sitting down beside his mom, comforting her in the dead of night, to her strong voice waking her grandchildren up early in the morning for school.

We have been made privy to her life, and as I sit in the back of the car I was shaken by the revelation how the mere fact of her existence is the greatest gift I've been bestowed and one I will not be able to return.

Sometimes we forget we have a past. Sometimes we forget our lives are much more intertwined and complex than we think. Sometimes we overlook how a person we think so insignificant could have so much effects on our lives and people around us.

"The first is the recognition that the great mystery is not death but birth. The great gift is life and loving and being loved in return." - Arthur Dobrin