can never go home.

I know people say you can never go home, like once you leave, you are too old and different to fit into the cubby named "Leena, age 9" or "Leena, loves drawing" or anything really. Are the toys I left behind no longer a part of me, now that I do not play with them? Are the people no longer mine, now that I have other people in my sphere? Sometimes, yes, I feel so different from them. Like they can no longer understand me. Even my sister, who is but two years my elder, feels a little different. We have not lived in the same house for six years. That is a long time, especially during a time when we are maturing and growing and finally shedding the awkward skin of childhood. So sometimes, we all drift away in a lazy haze, softly like a feathered kiss, without even knowing why.

But the truth is, there is something inherently beautiful about family and home. The peace I felt when I returned was something lovely and sweet and languid, spreading like the warmth of a fire after being lost in a winter forest for days. It is home. It is the streets I know like the back of my hand. It is the lone dinosaur toy I played with when I was young, sitting on the shelf like it is treasured. It is the perfect silence. It is the song I want to play again and again. It is like an anthem in my mind, "You are home." It is where I know I am loved. It is beautiful.

It also made me think of this song, Open Up by Editors, which is lovely in and of itself, but also pretty much expresses everything I felt. At around time 2:30 in the song, the repeated "You are Home" is  pretty much the anthem I feel once I land in Chicago. What a beautiful place.

in the palm of my hand.

I hold my home in the palm of my hand.
Its warmth like a sun ray caressing the land.
Diffusing out, like gentle thoughts on the edge
of my mind, like family photographs sliding off the ledge.
Well, when I feel alone, without a comfort in sight,
I hold my home in the palm of my hand
and try to hold on with all my might.
I let it ground me, surround me, and confound me
with lovely illustrations of family and support.
I try to capture the flood of memories,
spilling like grains of sand through my hand.
They rush back and forth, rapids in a gentle river,
as I try to stay afloat.

---

There have been times when I thought I could be strong and stoic: all alone, but not lonely. I thought about the fact that I could cool my heart down, trap feelings under the sense of responsibility and adulthood, and leave behind the memories. I thought I was immune to these feelings of homesickness, but instead, it seems that I am just as susceptible, just as compromised. I miss my family, left behind as I moved forward to find myself again. Though it seems like we are the edges of a map, distance measured in miles upon miles, distance seeming like stretching deserts of molten sand, distance seeming like the unseen other shore of the ocean. But they are not far.

They are not far, I know, for they are in my heart.

-

homesick.

There are times when I lay down and I feel the softness of the sheets beneath me and the pillow under my head. But, my mind is flittering away, on the edges of an organic notion of timelessness. I feel as though I am a soul without a body, a sun without a sky, diverting my attention from the physical planes of my body and thinking about my mind's place in the world. I feel my body shifting through landscapes, one moment I feel the grass beneath my skin, prickling and irritating and itchy. The sun beaming its warmth over me like a soothing hug, while the breeze lifts my hair and places it lightly on my face. I morph again, shifting from the cocoon of warmth to the freedom of flying through the sky. I feel the air beneath me, my clothes fluttering like useless wings allowing me to float. I feel the clouds condensing around me, a thunder sound in belly of the horizon and a lightning flash from the periphery of my vision. The colors dance underneath my eyelids, and I feel energized. This feeling, this wandering lost feeling, is one I experience late at night, with the thick blackness overwhelming me. I can't see where I am or where I am going.
In this moment, there is this sense of motionless time. I feel in one place, but in another at the same time. In the dark, I can't see where I am, physically, emotionally, mentally. Am I in this new place, with different sounds, smells, and feels? Am I lost between places, between home and change? So, I close my eyes, and I think of myself at home in Chicago. On the couch with my favorite blanket. The sounds of my mother cooking downstairs, my sister upstairs, and my dad walking in the front door -- all soft lullabies of comfort, safety, and belonging crooning in my ear. The smells of a home cooked meal and the crisp air wafting in from the open door that my dad just walked in. Outside the window, snow falls in snowflakes to the ground like small kisses from the sky. In the next instant, I remember I am nowhere near home. I am at my new home, which may be temporary or permanent, and I feel lost and drifting. Will I ever find once again the roots of family and home, when I cannot feel more disconnected from my own? Or will I be forced to find a new location, a new emotional anchor? Perhaps I need a new place to rest my head, where I can listen to the sounds around me and they'll croon to me like a lullaby. And maybe then, during those cold nights, I can shut my eyes and feel truly at rest. Truly at home.