Another year

It must be lonely. Breaking fast by yourself. When you use to have a wife fussing over food. You must have remembered how the four of us would wait at the table for the azan. Eyeing the food. All the time delicious. You have always said the best time of the year was when breaking fast. I must agree for I am enjoying it with my family, your grandchildren.

And then everybody grows up and everybody grows old.

Somehow I also remembered how you have always liked keroncong. I remebered the nights that you dimmed the lights down and put on the turntable to the tunes of old keroncong. Ibu would make you ABC or any dessert and sit with you talking the night out. I would be grumpy because keronchong was just not in. Bukaklah Casey Kasem ke apa.

Ayah, I was watching Mukhsin the other day. At the end of the movie two old couple sang this simple keronchong, maybe a bit low for ayah's taste, but it reminded me of both you, ayah and ibu.

I imagined Ibu singing out of tune and you singing everything like elvis. Or you would strum the guitar while Ibu still sing out of tune. Or you would sing and Ibu would strum, again right chord, wrong strum.


The clip from the movie Mukhsin. Pssstt thanks bear

It's your birthday and I can feel the loneliness.

We all miss you terribly and wish that things are just different.

Happy birthday ayah.