December tugs at me differently this time.. No matter where I am, this time of year always takes me back to the Philippines. Back to the province, back to the familiar ritual of going home. December there isn’t just a month. It’s a movement. It’s the season when people prepare leaves from work, line up for tickets, and plan long journeys with one clear intention: to reunite with family. It’s always a haggle, asking a colleague if they can swap schedules, counting the days and hoping to leave even just one day earlier, because that extra day with family always feels worth it.

Going home to my hometown was never simple. It was a 12-hour bus ride if you chose the cheaper route, or 8 hours by van if you were lucky enough to get a seat. Both options came with their own kind of exhaustion. The treacherous night trips, the winding roads, the stops in unfamiliar towns- Oh I just miss those rides more than I expected. It was always comforting to move through the dark, knowing that every mile brought me closer to home.

Sometimes I’d sit in a cramped van and recognize familiar faces. I’d find myself seated beside aunties and uncles who were also going home for the holidays, carrying boxes of pasalubong and stories from the city. Conversations came easily, even with strangers, because in December, everyone was headed in the same direction.

These trips are always unforgettable because of the understanding that once you leave your hometown, returning isn’t guaranteed. For many of us, going back happens once a year if we’re lucky.

Sometimes it’s after two years. Sometimes four. The distance isn’t just physical. It’s shaped by responsibilities, finances, and the reality that opportunities for education and work are almost always in the city.

People don’t leave because they want to. They leave because they have to.

At a certain age, you don’t realize it right away, but once you officially become a visitor in your own hometown, every return feels slightly unfamiliar. The places you remember aren’t quite the same. The small details have shifted. The kids you left behind are suddenly taller than you, their voices deeper, their lives already unfolding without you there to witness it. New generations are born- faces you don’t recognize but are told are family.

You’re lucky if you still find your contemporaries around. If they’re not there, it’s because they, too, have left- for work, for study, for a chance at something better. Just like you did.

Each visit requires quiet preparation- not just for the journey, but for the changes waiting at the end of it. Change becomes the one thing you can count on. It shows you how much time has passed. How people have softened or grown distant. How the version of home you carry in your memory no longer exists in the same way.

And then there are your parents.

The strongest reminder of time passing is seeing them age. They are no longer the unshakeable figures you left behind. Slowly, they begin to show signs of tiredness, silence, and vulnerability. Life settles into them differently now. And each goodbye feels heavier than the last.

It’s been three years since I left my hometown, and I don’t know when I’ll be able to return again. December makes that uncertainty louder. It brings nostalgia, longing, and a quiet ache that sits with me through the cold. No matter how far I go or how much my life changes, home never fully leaves me.

It waits-
in night bus rides,
in December memories,
and in the space between who I was
and who I have become.