Words# 604,
" Home: "What do you mean by HOME". Part(1)
Primarily home is a place where we take refuge safely ,peacefully; .Love, caring and sharing among the members of family are the basic components that turns a house to sweet home:The age-old adage"home is where the heart is " has become a cliche.
To me, it is neither the beauty of nature with wonderful environment nor a baroque marvelous piece of mansion decorated with expensive furniture and most sophisticated gadgets but the loving relationship between the members and interdependency to each other constitute the bond of family, the plinth of the family who come to live together in a dwelling place called 'home'; home brings the desired joy, peace and security to everybody of the family who belong to.
Home does not refer to structure of some concrete building; it is more personal or emotional refuge; even it can be something abstract. (a place in my mind).
My father had transferable job in Indian Railway. So I moved with parents from small two bedroom Railway quarter to big bunglows with outhouses which were almost near to where I spent my early life. I, even, did not know the difference between "home" and the house my father owned during his service time until his retirement. I consider all of them equally as my home.
After marriage I moved with my husband from smaller bachelor's house to bigger officers' bungalows, cherishing the same feeling. But, by the time I was then aware of the difference between home and houses. I never felt that those are property of company. My children never scratched the wall with pen or colored pencil unlike most of my friends' houses I noticed the wall marked dirty with alphabets ABCD and drawings. If asked, they often shrugged shoulder to say reluctantly, "it is after all company's house, let our kids enjoy.'
My husband was the first one of his batch to build and shift to his own house . I was sad to leave the luxurious company's bungalow and the neighborhood which became as my extended family. On the final day of shifting, tears rolled down my cheeks, surrounded by neighbors who came to say 'bye'.
They consoled me "you are the lucky one among us to have your own house. Cheer up ! See, your husband looks sad to see you crying; give him a smile! We all will go in your house warming and stay overnight.' They wiped my eyes.
As my husband passed away suddenly with cerebral attack, and I was ill, my daughter brought me here with her posting in New York. Not only family and home but uprooted from own country, own land, it was quite challenging for me, and for any woman of sixty plus, to replant in a new land with different culture, rituals.
From early life I was an arduous lover of academic life and interested in art and creativity.
….’And Soul finds its own community’, so I did.
Now I don't feel disconnected as before ; I attend different religious retreat, poetry class, memoir writing ,Art, music drama. I don't feel lonely. Even in pandemic I feel sad for others who have lost their near and dear ones; also for immense loss of lives ,loss of jobs, loss of confidence but not for myself. I am not burdened by the shadow of engulfing fear, and confusion of the future. There is no doubt that this pandemic will create a revolutionary change Let us hope positive. Every creation comes after destruction.
A new global society will emerge out of the chaos of pandemic .
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