HOME ALONE

Note: Fellow blogger Aayushi evocatively wrote about what home meant to her. I loved it, and decided to write about what home means to me. Here it is.  

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Home is when you start feeling for a house.

Home is tracking the cost of onions, potatoes, tomatoes and garlic. Home is being able to identify every vegetable the bania sells (before it’s cooked). Home is always purchasing pao kilo of everything.

Home is cracking open an egg and half-frying it. Home is measuring out the minimum amount of water needed to make Maggi. Home is really making it in two minutes.

Home is guesstimating how many cups of coffee a litre of milk will yield. Home is buying, boiling, cooling and refrigerating it.

Home is admitting that running out of sugar and salt is a domestic calamity.

Home is storing the numbers of three electricians, two plumbers and one odd-jobs man. Home is remembering (and paying) the fees of the paperwallah, the cable fellow and the cook-cum-maid. Home is fighting with the dabbawallah over a misplaced tiffin.

Home is grumbling about the quality of service these days, at age twenty-one.

Home is calculating how much I owe the istriwallah and how much the raddiwallah owes me. Home is having a file full of warranties. Home is remembering when the contract for pest control runs out. Home is sensing when the water purifier needs servicing.

Home is stashing away a not insignificant boodle in the wardrobe locker.

Home is stocking up on soap. Home is inspecting my toothbrush for wear. Home is avoiding the toilet which flushes erratically.

Home is spinning a load in the washing machine only when I run out of clean underwear. Home is singing while I dry and fold the clothes.

Home is switching the curtains, replacing handtowels and getting the tablecloth ironed. Home is using trays. Home is occasionally bringing out the crockery.

Home is wishing for warning before anyone comes over. Home is dusting frantically, and shoving things into the nearest cupboard. Home is cherishing the gift of storage space. Home is hoping the sofa is stainless. Home is believing that a damp cloth can fix anything.

Home is sitting by the window when it’s raining, and feeling protected. Home is leaving the front door open to let the wind whoosh by. Home is early nights, two blankets and noon awakenings.

Home is privacy. Home is loneliness. Home is a prison. Home is freedom. Home is a chore. Home is comfort. Home is money. Home is worth it.

Home is not what I possess. Home is what possesses me.

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10 thoughts on “HOME ALONE

  1. Lovely post, haha, and this is an entirely different take. More related to the practical aspects of home, and living alone (?).

    There were quiet some funny points and most were uncannily true.

    “Home is admitting that running out of sugar and salt is a domestic calamity.”

    Hahaha. And it is kind of endearing to have a boy write all this, about the mundane chores of housekeeping.

  2. Great post. So true, with all of us busy even my home faces such calamities. Loved ur style. Sorry but could not read ur last post through. 21st century english is beyond me

  3. Home is also something u return to default tiredlessly evey evening, expect someone to open door with a smile
    Home is fighthing with your society’s watchman over less water supply

    and so many more such things which are so mundane that i hardly ever noticed them …. too good a post u rock _ Tejashree

  4. Home is where I can read this and want to hug the 4 walls around me this very moment.
    Passing out next year and going back to India is seeming so damaging to the soul right now.
    Beautiful as always.

  5. excellent narration… like it soo much… these are the most vibrant things in life that we usually / simply ignore them……..

  6. When I had read it in January last year it didn’t make much sense to me. Now that I’m ‘Home Alone’ in a land far away from everyone dear to me, I could connect to every bit of it 🙂
    Home is panicking when the first thing I see in the morning of New Year day that the garbage bin is begging to be emptied and realizing I’ve run out of garbage bags and the all shops are closed today :-/

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