nineteen

I turned nineteen yesterday and I was happy, simply because I'm healthy and I have a family and that I experience the luxury of going to school. There was no celebration, only greetings that were all the more appropriate and pleasing to my ears.

"Happy birthday *Dudung!"

"Dolph, happy birthday!"

Even if I worked myself to death with the preparation of the food for the nursing tribute, and even if I nearly got into a verbal fight with an old man at the bus station on my way home, reading those greetings over again somehow made the burden lighter.

(*Dudung - literally means boy or little boy in Cebuano. It's my pet name inside the classroom.)