On “Home”
I woke up one morning with the memory of that great Simon and Garfunkel tune — “Homeward Bound”. I started to ponder about “Home” as my thoughts were escaping silently from me. What is home? Is home just an imaginary conception in our mind, or a tangible locale? Is home just a place we think of going back to everyday, that gives us a sense of belonging? Or, is home a locale that gives us a sense of security? What does home mean to an immigrant (pardeshi) who has crossed borders, or just moved to a town miles away from their hometown? Is home just where one gets freedom to be their true self?
As a young child growing up, we often consider our home to be our parents home. We never forget our experiences growing up in this home, and often reflect on the safety and the security we had whilst growing up. We long to go back to this home and often wish our parents never move away from their residence. I have heard many a parent lament that their kids are absolutely against them moving away from their childhood residence.
When we visit our childhood home in our adult life the people and things we encounter trigger a flood of memories in our mind. Sometimes it’s the picture of a loved one who is dead and gone, the taste of a familiar dish that our mom made, the desk where we learned to write, the cricket game or badminton in the gully next to where we lived. We open the bookshelf to see a familiar book that we read umpteen times. It’s almost like we are living the other great song from the 60’s — “In my Life” by the greats Lennon and McCartney. So could it be that home is just a reference to a flood of memories that we associate with a stage in our life.
Now our nomadic ancestors moved from place to place seeking shelter and food. So obviously to them home meant where there was shelter from the weather and environment and protection from the wild. It also meant a place close to abundant supply of water and food (edible vegetation and a hunter’s paradise). With the rise of human settlements and cohabitation the concept of home perhaps evolved to mean something more personal.
As we enter adulthood our life takes us in many different directions. Some of us who go to college away from our hometown get to experience living on our own amongst strangers for the first time. Some of us find the experience tormenting and scary. The safety and security our home provided appears to have vaporized. We feel uncertain which road to travel and which turns to take. This leads to our first bout of what is termed home sickness, the longing to be in a place where we won’t experience much uncertainty. But as the years go by and we get familiar with the surroundings and make new friends it feels as if we have found our second home. We start looking forward to our trip back to our “Hogwarts” at the end of summer. So it appears that as we get comfortable with our surroundings we start to experience a sense of belonging to the place and begin to call it home or home away from home.
As we graduate and start our careers we experience the next shift. Suddenly we are thrust in to a new locale and it almost feels like Groundhog Day all over again. If we are lucky we are already attached with a girlfriend or a boyfriend or a spouse. For most though that are unattached this experience is really the beginning of your lonely pursuit to find the meaning in your life. For the first time in your life, you alone are responsible for building your life. You may have well wishers but no one else is vested interest in your life. The security blanket that your parents provided has suddenly gone “Poof”. In your quest to break your solitude you seek out new friendships and look to attach yourself to someone or something a hobby or a pastime. Your home, where you live feels as if it’s missing something. You look around and see the folks around you that are attached with their significant others and some times their little children. You feel as if your life suddenly is lacking. Suddenly your longing for your own home with a spouse and children starts to take shape. Empty rooms in the house fully furnished highlight your loneliness. It’s not that you are not busy but yet you feel that your home is empty. You want someone to share in your experiences and build your home.
Fast forward a few years. You now have a family and have built your dream home and life is wonderful with little kids running around a beautiful garden with flowers and fruit trees. You have found your “Eden” or “Xanadu”. Other than building your nest egg you have few worries and you are no longer feeling home sick. Somehow you have found your purpose in life or so you think.
Your parents are getting older and need your attention. If you live in different cities or countries you start to struggle to find time to spend between your current home that you have built and your old home that built you. For the first time cracks begun to emerge in your concept of home. You want to be in both places and share in both experiences. Memories flood your brain as you shuttle between your abodes.
Then comes separation either your parents are no more or your children grow up and leave your home and suddenly you find yourself in a vaccum again having to redefine your concept of home.
The final frontier approaches when your spouse gets ahead of you and bids goodbye to the world. You are left to deal with life all by yourself again. You reminisce what all home has meant for you over the years and lament having lost all that. Your life once again seems out of purpose. Until you bid adieus, this last phase of your makes you want to be an itinerant, nomadic soul seeking your new home or waiting for your time to join your spouse and your parents in their new home — “After Life”.
