I always wonder when one truly feels “at home” even when away from home. Opinions vary, of course, and an individual’s present life context is of utmost importance which may shape their ability to provide a palpable answer to this. Maybe, I should shed some light on mine, which is coercing my subconscious to write about this.
As a graduate student living in the USA, I do not have family and old friends from my birthplace (Kolkata, India) here. Loved ones and their memories form an integral part for that homely feeling to sink in. Now as graduate students, we form close friendships with people around, but ultimately all of us are part of a drifting crowd, who enter a group in periodic intervals and then leave to migrate to their next ventures. The beautiful experiences we share, rarely get the nourishment to transform to an eternal memory, that I associate with a home.
My overtly emotional temperament came to the fore to put some thought on this scenario. I realized that sometimes, an out-and-out awareness of simple ambient details, animate or inanimate, might also effectively instill in me a sense of feeling “at home”.
Streaks of old memories surged in my mind when I tried to remember such details of my home in Kolkata. There, I could discern which walls were cracking, along with the spiders living inside them in peaceful co-existence. I knew the wall behind an almirah (the mischief had to be hidden from my mother :P) which had pencil markings, measuring my growing height with time. I was acquainted with the black/red ants who would come out for lunch through a hole in the drainage-pipe of the adjacent balcony, and would return around sunset after a long day’s stroll. I developed a friendship with the brownish kite (read: bird) who came around 3 pm to grab fritters of Marie biscuit. I was aware of the precise location on my bed, where sunlight seeping in from the window will fall at 4 pm, suggesting that it’s time to go out and play cricket/football. All this signified “home” for me, a place where I was safe and secure.
I strained my mind to evaluate if I can identify similar stories of my present apartment. A firm believer of the mantra “Stay foolish, stay young” proclaimed by Steve Jobs, my room is filled with posters/stickers of “Batman”, “Scooby Doo”, “Tom and Jerry” along with photos and random quotes related to music. But apart from all this, there is a secret - the one encompassing a bookshelf.
To house the umpteen number of books (much more than my reading capacity at this point), I once bought a second-hand bookshelf. Right from its incipient days, the structure was a bit wobbly. To satisfy my inane curiosity, I measured how much the shelf was leaning away from the wall. Sometime in 2018, the distance was around five inches. I presumed that with the ever-increasing weight of books, it would crumble in no time. But although other fixtures in the room gradually broke down, this shelf somehow survived.
A day before this writing, much to my delight, I found that the five inches tilt was still similar to the hilt. I know this was inane, but it made me tremendously happy. Maybe, this shelf was my own version of Leaning Tower of Pisa and was trying to teach me about life- to bend but still be resilient against all odds. It was fulfilling to realize that this room is uplifting me by sharing its secrets, so that I can look ahead. The intangible but deep-rooted “at home” feeling within me, arose.
I request everyone to search and hold on to these secrets of your home. These are the ones that will be beside when you are alone and are trying to steer the ship out of the dangerous waters of life, towards a new beginning.
Comments