[ENTRY 101..✍️]

Today, my parents came to visit and as usual, mom brought clothes, shoes and bags for me and my sisters. I am ever so jubilant with how the weather is in my favour: gray skies, icy air, rain, and some bits of thunder here and there.

It was nearing noon when the rain started pouring down at its extremity, a most beautiful sound mixed with the old songs dad was singing on karaoke. Not long after, my big sister shouted my name from downstairs and when I came down to her room to ask why, she said mom and younger sis needed an umbrella.

"Okay.. But where are they?" I inquired from her partially opened door, only my head sticking in.

"In dad's truck. Trapped," she casually answered, not looking away from her laptop.

The truck was parked near the jetmatic pump which is about 50 steps away from the house. Or probably more. I'll count it one of these days. Anyway, the parking area here is in an open space so there's no roof that protects the vehicles from rain at all. I got the umbrella and was about to leave the living room when dad called my attention to look at his phone. By this point, he had paused from singing and was just blasting the same genre of music through the speakers that gives me that feeling of childhood nostalgia. He showed the cover photo of the playlist he was playing from YouTube, which had a picture of a young man bearing the look from the good old days back before I was even born.

"I looked like this in my youth," stated my father, a goofy smile lingering on his countenance.

I stared at the man's face on the screen, which, upon my research before typing this, was Neil something.. err. Darn it. I forgot again. Wait up.

Neil Diamond!

That's it. I'm familiar with some of his songs but it was only until I watched this certain episode of "Big Bang Theory"—the one where Amy and Howard bonded for the first time—that I somewhat took mark of his name, which, as you've already seen, didn't retain in my memory very much.

Looking at the singer's photograph, I saw no resemblance between him and dad at all.

"Really?" was my dubious response.

"Yes. I looked like that."

"And with that.. hair?"

The artist had really thick, dark hair and was kind of long. I don't know what that particular hairstyle is called but I've always thought it rather looks like a lion's mane.

"Yeah, I did kind of have long hair back then.."

Hmm.. I don't recall having seen dad with that kind of hairstyle from his old pictures but that should be interesting to see. I remember having seen mom's and it threw me into a fit of laughter because it just looks utterly funny to me. I only smothered a quiet laugh as I turned to go.

My, but it was raining so hard!

Before I could even reach the truck, I was already laughing my ass off because there, at the back of the vehicle, where, fortunately, a tarped roof had been set up—were my mom and younger sister: squatting vis-à-vis on the floor at the very center to avoid getting damped from the open sides. I approached them with a laughing face and upon their seeing me, that laughter instantly spreaded to their very own frontispieces because my visage bore the complete expression of one who just witnessed a comical scene. And it really was a comical scene. Like.. y'all have a house .. What y'all doing cramped in there? 😂

"What in the world were you guys even doing here?" I asked in between frolic laughter.

Turns out my sister just wanted to see the new changes of the pick-up truck; only the rain started pouring mightily while they were at it.

"We don't know how to set-up the side covers.." mom added, making me take a glance at the roof rack.

"Okay mom, you go first," sissie said and I went round towards the tail of the truck to receive mom with the umbrella, which wasn't big enough to shroud all three of us. I could've just made another trip to get my sister after mom but the bitch decided to just bolt her way towards the house. Oh well, less trouble for me. But even with two people, the umbrella was almost useless with the intensity of the rain so I just let mom have it all for herself.

"It's okay. I'm taking a shower, anyway!" I shouted through the strong pattering sound as I released myself into the open sky, skipping puddles on the way with not much success, really.

When I reached the house almost completely soaked, my sister was standing near the door from the salon, talking to dad, when a childlike desire suddenly came over me. I didn't lift a leg for the front step and just remained standing outside, the roof's eaves shielding me from getting wetter. I looked at my sister with a contained excitement and when she met my gaze, I told her with the intent to tempt: "Let's bathe in the rain."

This invitation, to my satisfaction, proved enticing enough to be instantly accepted with willing delight as my sister's whole face brightened up to join me. So under the rain we got thoroughly soaked, all the while emitting sounds of mirth from the spontaneity of this unexpected occurrence. Ah, but I couldn't remember the last time I bathed in the rain! When I'd gather my recollection of it, the image I see is when I was still a kid, laughing and running around with my cousins and sisters and friends. There's a pleasant melancholy the rain brings in the comfort of your own solitariness, especially in the warmth of your own chamber; but playing right underneath it brings a completely different kind of pleasure to your senses. Instead of my usual quiet disposition wherein I'm lost in my own thoughts of fictional universes or far-away realities, I suddenly become a participant of the very kind of scenarios I sometimes play in my imagined world in this very kind of weather itself. The rain against my skin was cold and just something else when enjoyed in such a way.. The sensation it brings was pure, authentic, genuine bliss. For a moment, the rain washed all of my worries away and life was perfect and lovely, as if I was experiencing that childlike freedom I used to have.

There's a corner in the eave where the rain pipe is broken so it creates this, hmm.. What should we call it.. Let's just say "homemade waterfall". Haha. Oh, but standing right below it was the best part! The force of the collected rain from that height would tickle our backs and heads and my sister and I couldn't stop laughing as we'd take turns bathing underneath it. Mom was absolutely jovial, too, watching us. And Dad was taking a video. I lowkey hoped it looked rather cinematic with the "waterfall" being near the tall shrub in front of the house with its pretty red flowers.. And then my sister in her pajama shirt and shorts.. And most especially me in my pastel light-blue spaghetti-strapped summer mini dress.. Hehe.

In my head, the scene looked absolutely beautiful, like in a music video; but in reality, we were shivering and our teeth were chattering from the cold. Lmfao.

When the rain slowly died down, I went to the bathroom to take a full shower and I felt clean and fresh and light-hearted the rest of the day. In the afternoon, we ordered two boxes of pizzas and I became stuffed after two slices. Altogether, it's a delightful Sunday!

Sometimes, I forget just how blessed and lucky I am so I'll dedicate this entry to say I love my family ❤️

But wait till I'm not in my best humour and they piss me off because I'll surely say I'm sick of them 🙂

Haha!

It's almost midnight now.

I need to pee but I'm too lazy to get up..

Yan's Dear Diary