I woke up with crusted blood on my face the second day in a row. It's not a good way to wake up. I felt immobilized and my mouth felt dry. It took a few minutes to shift into a position that wouldn't soil everything. Then I managed to find a sink, but not before a drink of water. I dabbed and patted it's remains with tissue paper but there's still a little bit of it left. I'm afraid it'll burst tomorrow morning and I'll wake up like this again. I never was queasy with my own blood, until now. I suppose I'm growing up, in some strange way. I think it's the involuntariness of the process. Except it doesn't feel out-of-my-control. It just feels like someone punched me in the face and I'm waking up after having passed out from a fight.
A few months ago, I was sitting on one of the small stools in the kitchen, the ones that make you feel like a little child again, waiting for the water to boil. I was making tea for my dad and thought how cool a feeling that was, to be home again, doing home-things in a warm kitchen where everything was as familiar as it was leisurely. But later, in a different city, in a place just called home, a place that I have to remember by numbers - fourth right turn, third house on the left - a place I have to recognize by signboards and which I sometimes pass over in the dark because I miss the gate, a place where almost-strangers let you in when you ring the bell; I waited the same wait, standing and waiting for the water in a newer pateeli . It wasn't warm at all; it was just a cheerless, empty, disconsolate feeling. It made me feel low to even think of another place as home. Eating in alien plates, drinking in alien glasses. I never learnt to memorize the house number or the telephone n...
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