Homesick

by Raghu Sarangarajan

I had to leave home yesterday. I miss home very badly. I wish I had never left. I wish I had the power to turn back time and go back to the comfort of my home. But I don’t think that is possible. I wish I could ask someone about it but I am not able to. Apart from letting out a shrill cry, I am not able to produce any other sound. There is some feeble sound that comes when I pass wind, but I don’t think I can use that for communication. So many questions and no answers. I am exhausted. I need to sleep.

I am surrounded by strange people. Everything is a blur. I am able to hear their voices but I am not able to say who is who. There is one voice that keeps repeating. The voice is very pleasant and nice and sounds like home. I miss my home. I wish I had never left home.

I am scared if I will last long here. I am expected to eat through my mouth. I thought the mouth is only to make sounds. The home-like-person is trying to give me food through that. I never had to do all this at home. Whatever I needed always went directly to the stomach. Here, I am expected to move my mouth again and again and then something goes into it. This I am expected to do repeatedly till the point I feel that I don’t want any more. Sometimes, I fall asleep when I am doing this. This home-like-person wakes me up whenever I do that. I get reminded of the way my home used to wake me up when I fell asleep and stopped moving around. I miss my home. I wish I had never left.

At home, I used to float around in a different kind of space. Here I don’t get the same feeling. I am able to move my hands and legs more freely now, but I still am not comfortable doing that. There used to be a good slimy feel to my movements. I miss it here. I don’t like this new “freedom”. I feel tired because of the rapid movements I am able to make now. I feel sleepy all the time. Wait, I feel something slimy coming from my backside. Am I going back home? Yipee, I am going back home! But wait, there is something less slimy coming from the front. Am I not going home? No, I am not going back home. Somebody is removing the slimy feeling. I feel dry again.

I don’t understand these people. They don’t let me feel at home at all. They always make sure I am dry. I always have something wrapped around my hip. Just below the entry to my erstwhile food pipe. I have fond memories of playing with it. It was my playmate. I used to swing on it. Towards the end, I had fun pulling it till home sent signals to me to stop doing that. As I grew big, there was very little space for the food pipe. I used to play by wrapping it around my neck. It is no longer there now. I miss it. It has been missing since the day I left home. I shouldn’t have left home.

I miss home and I let out a shrill cry. Whenever I let out this cry, immediately they try to force food into my mouth. I don’t want food. I want comfort. Who eats food for comfort? I need to go back home. The darkness, the dampness, the smells, the freedom of floating around, I miss all that. No, I cannot stay here any longer. I am going back home. But how? Wait, maybe I should try getting into my position, the position I used to be at home. No, this is not helping. I am not going back home. Looks like I am doomed forever.

When I was at home, I was alone but I never felt lonely. But here, outside my cocoon of comfort, I am surrounded by people who keep making weird noises at me, I feel lonely. They speak a different language and their voices are normal when they are talking to each other. But when it comes to me, their pitch rises, the sounds are different. I feel side-lined. Something is not right. They are treating me differently. I feel I am constantly being judged. From the breath I take, to the colour of the slimy liquid from my backside, everything is noticed.  I think this is way things are here. I have to accept and get used to what is being meted out to me. The rules are different here. This is not my home.

But I must not panic. Coming to think of it, I don’t think I could have stayed long at home. I was growing big, and even though my home was accommodating my growth, I don’t think it would have grown beyond a certain level. I remember the voice from home telling me that I would be moving out. I think even home was ready to push me out. I remember the day I came out. I felt an excruciating pain. I was not prepared for so much pain. But home, as good and prepared as it always was, flexed and twisted to push me out. In the dark tunnel of anguish, I finally saw light. When I came out the world outside hit me with full force. My eyes were blinded by the light and there was something strange entering my nose. That is when I started crying. I do not know why I cried so much. Was it for being pushed out of home, or was it because of the light or was it the fear of what is going to come? I do not know.

All good things have to come to an end. My stay home too has come to an end. I miss home, but whenever this home like sounding person holds me close to her, I feel comforted. I get reminded of home and all the good times that I had there. I don’t know why, but she gives me a feeling that things are going to be alright out here.

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