Freewriting: Home
What is home? Home is a place where you feel safe. It can be a person, a place, or even a word. It doesn't have to physical, thrive within time and space nor specific to describe. It has to make you feel safe, for your heart to connect , for your fears and insecurities to dissapear, and your mind to be at peace. Walking in Jamaica ave, Queens during the day or walking around Washington Heights on a weekend morning feels strangely home to me. The traffic of cars combined with the almost- suffocating feeling of the crowds around you; the merchants shout to sell you their goods and it all takes me back to certain places and times I left behind in my childhood.
Eating my mother's arepas feels like home.
Drinking a glass of chicha feels like home.
Finding someone who gets my Spanglish feels like home.
Meeting someone who wants to learn about me as much as I want to learn about them is home.
Walking long distances feels like home.
Putting my thoughts on paper, especially when they have been on my head for several hours or days, hits very close to me, not to mention is satisfyingly irresistible.
Laughing with my friends feels like home.
Rejoicing in the presence of someone is home.
I left everything I knew was home behind when I came to this country and I have been finding and building pieces of that home here.
Home is a combination of your past experiences, your longing for a place that feels familiar. I think that is how you connect, and survive in new places, since you have already lived those experiences and can therefore, recognize them.
Home is also being loved and accepted. No judgments, no questions. It is what I felt when I started hanging out with Arabs last year and they embraced my background and made me, a stranger, see I was one of them too. That is one of the kindest acts anyone has ever done for me.
