Seeing Ghosts in Beautiful Places

"The shade was right and the sun's rays refracted against a thousand leaves to leave a gentle glow. What heat managed to penetrate was brushed away by the perfect breeze. "

You'd think that there was no place on earth as perfect as this. But there are; countless of beautiful sceneries, each of which the majesty of its view is only rivaled by the seeming perfection of the moment. Luckily, of the millions of patches of heaven on earth that exist on our planet, this summer has allowed me visit to a few. Probably far from the most beautiful by the world's ranking, but breathtaking nonetheless. It's hard to imagine how anything could take away the feeling of the perfect moment when I am here. But I can easily imagine what it would take to do the impossible and improve upon this perfection - and it is if you were here.

It first came far from the city, we were headed towards a place of which the name at first seemed doubtful. It was called a farm, so my hopes weren't high as I expected some sort of plantation. Little did I expect the grandeur that awaited me as I found myself treated to one of the most exquisite places I have been to. It was s beautiful place, well developed. There was a small lake (if you could call it that) in the middle of the scenery and a small boat at the end of a small little pier was open. I climbed aboard, and rowed myself around. It was in that moment as I took in the ambiance of serenity did I see you, and I imagined your dimpled smile when you were right in front of me, as we shared this moment together. Perhaps it was my desire to be dramatic or perhaps my moment of being neurotic, that made me drop the oars for a moment and reached out to grab this vision of you, only to have you disappear like smoke between my fingers. As I docked myself back to dry land, I saw a tall tree house, and as I climbed its spiral stairway, I could see you at the top, goading me to come top quicker to see the view. Of course I obliged, only to be disappointed when reaching the very top, as I enjoyed that view alone. Along that afternoon, I would see you in every corner of that place where I could imagine us posing for the perfect picture. I could imagine all to well. By the end of that visit, I had all but chased this vision so vivid, that only to preserve my dignity and belief in my sanity do I hesitate to call it a hallucination. As we left the "farm" this ghost teased me one more time as I saw it gesture for me to take her hand. My mind told me to stop this. But my heart had me reach for it anyway - yet again only to disappear and leaving me with a clenched empty hand.

And until that day came to end, I would see ghosts of you in every beautiful place that I came across. Probably spawned from my desire to share these places and these moments with you. I saw you by the red tree at the butterfly farm. I saw you you dip your legs in the floating cottages of lake danao. And finally, I saw you lean against my arm in the car as we went home, you were exhausted from our day in beautiful places.


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"My love. I have long realized that my life would not end if you're not in it. But that doesn't change the fact that it would be so much better if you were"
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