Where is Home?

I have been back in India a bit longer than a week. Last year I was here for almost three months but was very busy working on my mother’s sickness and subsequent issues. This year, I am a bit more relaxed, and it has given me the opportunity to observe with a detached mind.

As it probably happens with everything, as time passes, life changes, people change, circumstances change. We had left India to study in the US in 1998. Now 15 years later, I find that the atmosphere here is familiar but also very different. It is like a painting - I had drawn the outline, but someone else has filled in the details and colors. This is a very strange feeling. Even relationships seem so real yet faint at the same time.

For people like us, where is home really? What do you define as ‘home’?

I grew up and lived my parents’ dream – school, engineering, study abroad, etc. Now I find that their dream has changed, morphed into something that is unfamiliar to me. I trained to score a goal on their behalf, only to find that the goal post has moved. It is a strange unnerving feeling. Makes me question evermore – what is the purpose of all this?

In the US, we have a ‘life’ – pretty satisfying work, a comfortable house, great friends, nice vacations, time goes by fast and we live the years one by one. Here in India, we have caring relatives, great food, pollution, heat and humidity, busy and noisy atmosphere - complete with its own charm. But as I stand in between the two, I find it very hard to define either as my true home.

Growing up we moved a lot, every two to four years we moved because my dad had a transferable job. It did not affect me so much, infact I used to like it. Every move implied a fresh start, new friends, and new sense of discovery. I never felt out of place, even on the first day in a new place, new school, and new people. I loved the new smells, sounds, and tastes of new places. But today, two very ‘familiar’ places are making me feel so distant and insecure. This feeling is very new to me. I have no name for it.

Today I share with you this pervasive feeling that has come over me that I may never know my purpose, my home. I may never get to realize the true essence of the things around me. I am on a path, but I am not sure if this is the right one or if this has a destination. I feel I have to let go of everything and ---

“Let the blow fall soon or late,
Let what will be o'er me;
Give the face of earth around
And the road before me.
Wealth I seek not, hope nor love,
Nor a friend to know me;
All I seek, the heaven above
And the road below me.”

 -- Vagabond, by R.L. Stevenson