I took a lot of things for granted when my dad was alive.

While my husband and I were working on our furnishing, I realized how laborious and back-breaking the project was. It took us time and a meter-long patience to carry out a particular task — from assembling a simple equipment to attaching a floating cabinet to the wall.

For 11 years, I lived in a house (in the Philippines) that my father built with his own hands and not even once did I thank him for that.

I remember when I was in grade school, my dad brought me with him to see an empty lot near the edge of the town. It was full of sand, stones and hollow blocks. While we were walking around and he was ”inspecting” the place, all I wanted was to go home and play.

Years later, I came back to that lot and a two-storey, eight-room house was standing on it and papa said,

”Go pick your room upstairs.”

My father wasn’t an engineer nor an architect. He did not have any formal education on construction and interior design. But he personally made the blueprints and furnished the 3 buildings in our compound and together with friend-consultants and relative-carpenters, built the house I grew up in.

It wasn’t a mansion. In fact, our family only lived in the upstairs, since the downstairs was used as a dormitory for students. But until now, it remains the coziest and warmest house for me.

Now that my husband and I finished adorning our living room, all I could think of is inviting my dad over to see the works of our hands… or rather, the work of the carpenters who we resorted in hiring.

I don’t even have anything to brag about. But just the thought of my dad sitting in my couch, in my house, gives me a butterfly feeling of pride and joy.

If only.