Dear PiePie,
We’ll be moving to our new home in a few hours’ time. It’s been a long time coming since we bought the place 9 months ago, but Covid delayed renovations. It’s small, as is typically the case with most housing in Singapore, but a home is defined by more than its size or wall colors or furnishings or views. When you shall eventually leave the apartment which you will call home, what you’ll remember is the people and the experiences and the memories created. It is what you’ve done in that space, rather than the space itself, that eventually sticks with you.
And so we’re excited. This new home will be likely be the place where you’ll have your earliest memories, and we can’t wait to see the things you’ll do for the first time in this apartment. We can’t wait to see you to jump off the sofa, stare at yourself in the full-length wall mirror (since you already do that with all mirrors), and inevitably bang your head on the countertop. We can’t wait for you to fill out your closet, or to choose your bed, or to decorate your walls and doors. Mostly, we can’t wait for you to grow, in a space that we hope you’ll associate with love and caring and pleasant memories.
As with all moving, as we embrace something new, we are letting something go as well. And while we weren’t here for very long – just over 18 months – it was the very first place you stayed in.
This was your grandpa’s apartment. It’s a tad bigger than our new place (~1.4x bigger), but it’s also quite a bit further from town. That didn’t matter though, as Covid had us locked in the place for months on end. And while you won’t remember any of the things you did here, your mom and I certainly will. We will remember you being rudely awaken by loud car revs at 6am on a Saturday morning (turns out it was a bunch of groomsmen picking up the bride). We will remember rocking you to sleep as a baby, even as you got heavier and started to scratch our arms. We will remember the days spent watching BTS and Cocomelon and Moana and Pao de Queijo. We will remember your first birthday being celebrated in confinement, and your amazing ability to scale the nets and rock walls at the playground downstairs. Mostly, we’ll remember that you first entered grandpa’s house as a tiny tot not much longer than our forearm, and left as a walking, screaming, smiling toddler who understands when we tell you not to do something, but still do so anyways.
For me, I am simply grateful that your grandpa was able to be such an active participant in the earliest part of your life. You would love to be carried by him because he lets you grab things that we deliberately put out of reach on the highest shelves. Because he lets you open the fridge to feel the cool air even when the fridge beeps in displeasure for having the door open too long. You would love to go to him when he comes home, to take the bread he buys for breakfast the next day, and proceed to squish and remould the bread. And he would be happy for you to do so.
I think he really enjoyed your presence. Even as your screams woke him up in the morning and during afternoon naps. Even as he had to be super quiet in doing anything around the house when you’re sleeping. Even as your toys and playmat took over his entire living room and kitchen and bedrooms. I am simply glad, both for you and for him, that however short this time together has been, you once lived with your grandpa.
I am also glad that I had the opportunity to live with him during adulthood, with my family in tow, although I’ve never said this to him. Thanks grandpa, for having me back.
And now we look ahead. To a new apartment. To a new home. To new memories.
Love, Dad