Friday, April 08, 2011

Thoughts from up in the sky


I am writing from up there in the sky...it's darkness everywhere I look out of the small plane window, and it's quite with almost everyone sleeping, or looking at the glossy small screen at the seat in front of them.

I wonder what time is it..at the land I left behind, or the land I will reach in a few hours..or just in here..in this place above the dark vast ocean...where I belong now... Suddenly, the questions seemed much deeper..more troubling, as I once again stumble in the answer.. "where do you belong?", a thought whispers..."where's your home?"

Where I belong is here..a place floating up in here.. "this is just a void...an empty space...", stubbornly it adds. "where's homeland?"

It takes me a second, then I say reluctantly.."home is..." Pictures start flashing in the mind's eyes...a small child playing at the grandparents yard...climbing a tree...running after a bird...dirty hands and knees...small old stony roads in the quite village...cactus, figs, and olive trees..mom's golden bracelets ringing as she carries a dough to throw it in the small oven...the earth's smell after the first rain in september...a voice from the nearby mosque calling for the sunset prayer..jammed traffic in a crowded city on he medittereanian shore with red earth..cars' horns everywhere...AUB..laughs, and tears...hope, and disappointments... A suitcase...an airport...a cold night...and a plane...like the one I'm in... A foreign language..a fresh coffee...a white coat...and a name tag... Clean roads..big shops..green lawns.. Her smile..her eyes..her being away A coffee shop..long nights...cold wind...white everywhere..

"home is where you feel it is at the moment...a place for heart and mind... a familiarity feeling... A mental being.. Home is who we are...inside us..we take it to where we go.. When we laugh..when the butterflies inside us move ready to fly.. When we cry..when we really feel...when we take the masks off.. That's home.."

I listened carefully, but the thought was mute...for the moment at least! Or maybe I'm just sleepy.. Good night, home...see you soon!

2 comments:

Clementine Dahling said...

YAY, you finally posted!!!! I like the existentialism in this piece with the "bigger" questions coming to you in the nothingness of where you are.

One question: what's AUB?

Hashem said...

Thanks, Lauren!
AUB is my Alma mater: American University of Beirut. I did biology undergrad, and med school there. I spent almost one quarter of my life there...