Ours Forever

I want to tell you about tonight.

After work, Joe and Dad and I walked from our office down to a restaurant by the Singapore River. We spent a few hours drinking beer and eating nachos, though in truth, we just drank pints of cold draft beer and split one plate of nachos between the three of us.

The only thing really missing was little Mom, but she was off doing yoga so that made her absence a little bit easier to take, knowing she was at peace, probably balancing on her head, enjoying not having to listen to some of the jokes we make. We missed Ellie and Amelia, of course, but my sense is that they would have spent a lot of the night rolling their eyes and being unimpressed, or wishing that Mom was there to keep us in line.

After Dad paid the bill, we got up and gathered our suit jackets and briefcases and then Joe and Dad went off to the taxi stand and I walked back to the MRT to take the train home.

Not long afterwards, in response to a short text I had sent, Dad wrote me:

“Likewise. Times that are ours forever. Sleep well.”

It was one of those texts you can’t really respond to, though I spent some of the train ride trying to think of one.

What are the moments you think of right before you die if you never have those conversations and those beers? 

I spent some of the train ride thinking about that, too.