Saying Goodbye

It was 6:55 pm on a Wednesday night, and I was at the MCIAA terminal lounge waiting to board Flight No. 5J 547, when all of a sudden I heard a fellow passenger hum the song, "Saying goodbye is never an easy thing... but we never said that we'd stay forever..." I couldn’t help but initially cringe a little. With the setting and all, it was cheesy enough to make you think we were playing a scene out of a Tagalog movie of the same title. But then, I guess, for many of us there leaving Cebu for awhile or for long, it really didn't matter especially when the chorus lines were already racing through our heads, "Love will lead you back... love will lead you back to my heart (or is that “arms”?)..." Aww.

Indeed, no matter how often we do it, saying goodbye is never an easy thing. Just a few weeks ago, I said my farewells to beloved colleagues and my job of three years and truly it was, as Shakespeare once put it, "such sweet sorrow". On the one hand, you feel like a part of you just died as you lay to rest something so comfortable and familiar. On the other hand, you also feel reborn as you open yourself to new adventures and other interesting highways in life.

I looked around the terminal and wondered what or who these other passengers were also saying goodbye to. Would they be boarding this plane with mixed emotions just as I am? Maybe the OFW saying goodbye to her family of ten; or the lover I saw huddling in a corner earlier trying to use up as many "last minutes" as possible with her partner; or even the corporate executive still glued to his laptop, not quite able to say goodbye just yet to his emails or PowerPoint presentation…

Five minutes to takeoff and there we were on board 5J 547 with seatbelts properly buckled, while the song still plays fresh in my mind. Blast this LSS. I guess there’s no time like the present to download some goodbye thoughts:

The Why-oh-Why
When someone says goodbye, there are inevitable questions. Foremost is, we want to know why. Some conversations flow like this:

Friend 1: Why are you leaving?
You: I feel it’s time to move on.
Friend 2: Aha! You’re going to get married. (Ouch)
Friend 3: Why aren’t we invited?!
Friend 4: No, no, no… she’s going to do an “eat, pray, love”… travel the world (sounds good to me)
Friend 1: I don’t remember where you said you were going (I didn’t say)
Friend 2: Aha! You’re going abroad to apply for work.
Friend 3: Uh-oh, you’re not moving to the competition, right?
Friend 4: Why not, if the price is right…
Friend 5: You’re all wrong. She’s going to change careers, be a theatre actress and join the Wicked musical! (what an idea!)
Clearly, for you, it’s none of the above. But their reasons make more sense than your simple, “I want to move on”, so you just nod and say, “I believe you’re all correct.” And everyone cheers.

Apparently, when saying goodbye, you have to have a “very good reason” for leaving, or your well-meaning colleagues or friends will pull one out of thin air just for you. Case in point: Piolo Pascual. And then it's not enough to have an acceptable reason for leaving, you have to explain this carefully to each and everyone you know -- from family to friends, colleagues and, maybe, even to your followers on Twitter. Yes, saying goodbye is definitely not an easy thing.

Cleaning the Cave
With every goodbye comes spring… spring cleaning, that is. Clearing office space for one, which had been your cave for some years, always fascinates me. Where did all that stuff come from? Just how much paper does one accummulate in 3 years? Averse to useless baggage, here you thought you were already a master of disposing stuff and yet, there’s still a lot. And oh, isn’t it just scary to completely empty a recycle bin?

What about those reference files you felt were important enough to leave behind so neatly stacked in a corner… would anyone even care a month from now? And then, just before you could decide to throw or not to throw your favorite post-its, friends start to descend, hang around with small talk, and...

Friend 1: I just love your desk. Can I have it when you go? Mine’s too small.
Friend 2: Oh, look at that cute stuffed toy. It’s going to be lonely when you go. Why not transfer it to my cube?
Friend 3: Can I have your sign pen?
You: Which one, the blue one or black one?
Friend 3: Um, both of it?
Friend 4: I’ll take the rest.
By the time you’ve thrown or deleted the last piece, you slowly circle the room one more time and wonder how, even in its bareness, it still seems strangely full.

The Goodbye Parties
In the Philippines, we don't make it easy for anyone to leave. In fact, we make productions out of goodbyes. A person leaving has to live through not just one, but a series of emotional rollercoasters called despedida parties, where you are obliged to make a speech, endure a heart wrenching toast, or hug and assure everyone you will keep in touch (a promise too often forgotten). As if this isn't daunting enough, if you’re flying to a new place, your family and friends will organize an airport caravan to give you the proper Pinoy send-off, complete with last supper, tear-jerking goodbyes, and of course, multiple photo-ops. Very typical airport scene, isn’t it? By the time you finally get to leave, you are already properly exhausted and whirling with mixed emotions. And yeah, missing the hell out of everyone, even the annoying what’s-his-face.

The Flight
For me though, the most difficult part about saying goodbye is being asked and having to answer the question: Quo Vadis? Or, where are you going? Especially, when the truth is, sometimes, we leave not to really go to another point, but simply to move, to go.

As rational beings, we have this compulsion to organize how things go, to keep them from falling apart. To say that we are leaving and walking towards a future of “Who Knows?” might instigate some distress in the hearts of our dear friends. For the purposes of security and comfort perhaps, people need to know that you are completely in order in your life. This is how we tend to keep the balance of things.

There are moments, however, when the soul wants what it wants for no apparent reason. There are times when we need to get off the grid, to defy gravity even, so we can eventually get a better orientation from the heart. We fly to get a better perspective. And often, when we say goodbye to follow the heart, we end up saying “hello” to a happier and much more fulfilled life, whatever that is for us.

So, Quo Vadis, you ask? Currently, Flight 5J 547 is taking us to Singapore. For now, this would have to be enough. I may not know the final destination yet, but from this point on, I go where the heart is.

-- SunStar Weekend, December 17, 2011