Humans are naturally selfish creatures; we take almost everything for granted. However, it is not an excuse for us to be ungrateful. I was born with a fully covered head, with functional eyes, nose, mouth, and ears, untainted skin, a healthy brain and heart, and an able body. I was born in a complete family. On October 9, 2012, Tuesday, I have never felt so ungrateful in my whole life.
On this day, my batch had a field trip with its main objective: to socialize. We went to two different places where we had the chance to see how things were in another side of a coin. We went to realize how things were seen in a different perspective.
First, we went to the Care for the Elderly Foundation, Inc., Home for the Aged. This was where I realized how privileged I am to have a complete family with me and to have the youth to revel in before my hair turns gray.
The Care for the Elderly Foundation or Home for the Aged is a foundation that takes care of elder persons that have been abandoned, rejected, and those how have nowhere else to go. This was my first impression of the home for the aged. After the orientation by Ma’am Fe, the head of the foundation, I realized how wrong I was. It turns out that my opinion was the same as everyone else’s, and we were all wrong all along. We failed to see that the home for the aged was actually a place not only for persons of old age who have been rejected and abandoned, but also for those who were dearly loved by their children, and thus were left in the foundation’s hands to be taken care of properly. These children may have been too preoccupied with their work to attend to their parents. If before, we thought that the children who left their parents in the home for the aged are children who do not care for their parents, this time, we think that those same children love their parents as deeply as their parents loved them.
Our second destination was the School for the Visually Impaired. This was where the peak of my ungratefulness came to haunt me. When I first entered the school, I commented how lovely their surroundings were. They had a beautiful lake and a bridge over it. They also had many trees within the school. It was perfect for a learning environment. And then, I immediately realized how unfortunate the visually impaired in the school are, for they themselves cannot see and appreciate the beauty of their surroundings. They don’t have healthy eyesight like I do, like we do. Can they see how beautiful their place was? No, they can’t.
This was when I realized how thankful I should definitely be for my eyesight. A quote was posted on their corridor, saying “Ninety-five percent of learning is done using the eyes.” It must be very difficult for the students with visual impairment there to learn. Of course, it’s not easy, but eager teachers made them learn normally like ordinary students do. Even during the program, they proved that lack of eyesight doesn’t limit anybody’s capabilities and talents. More than anything, it heightens their other senses.
The field trip I had was, indeed, an experience where I can get lessons for life. And yes, I did learn. I learned that I should be grateful for all the blessings God has given me, that He has bestowed upon me. Now, I can say that I am thankful that I have a complete body: healthy eyesight, a nose that can smell, a mouth that can talk, and ears that can hear. I am thankful that I have a complete family to take care of me. I am thankful for my youth, where I have the chance to try different things and enjoy life at its fullest.
If you weren’t there to experience what I did, then there is at least I who can tell you that you should be grateful of what you have, because if you aren’t, God might just take back what He has given you that you took for granted. By then, it would be too late to realize the importance of those things. For you only realize the value of something when it’s already gone. That’s why we should better be grateful, very grateful, really grateful.