homeless?

‘Home is where the heart is’

Bullshit! It is а lame cliché used by suburban moms who want their 30-year-old hairy babies to come live in their old houses for homecooked meals, family dinners and warm tea after Sunday church.

Your fucking heart is in your chest, asshole! Grow up, stop calling your mother and get a job! That last sentence wasn’t really relevant but you get the gist.

I’m currently back in my hometown but I guess you’ve already picked up on that by the hate-introduction. I try as I might to avoid these too-often-visits because honestly I get bored after approximately 2,5 hours. Today I’m home ‘cause I had to finish my tattoo and after crossing the whole country for a little bit of ink I decided to spend a few extra days at home at least. But after rearranging my whole wardrobe (which basically includes clothes originating from 3^rd grade till last month) and after inventorying my library for books to ‘kidnap’ away with me and in the end feasting on my mom’s cooking… 

How hard is it to get rid of old stuff? Even when you know you must throw things away. I have like a million shoe boxes filled with little notes, papers and everything else collected over the years. Do all these things really have some sentimental value or is everything in my head? Are these boxes just rubbish or more likely a pile of memories you just can’t bring yourself to throw away? I know it’s all in my head, a feeling of nostalgia to old days. But I’ve always said that I don’t miss high school. I only get a few pleasant flashbacks from back then but that's it. The rest is buried. 

But I sit there and I’m trying really hard to remember something. It’s there in my head, creeping slowly through my whole body. I’m trying to remember a feeling. A tiny fibre stuck deep inside me. That’s nostalgia. An aching longing for forgotten faces, places, and emotions tied up in a ball of fire that’s burning harder and harder until all you have left is dirty ashes on the floor and you’re trying to pick them up from the ground. But here comes the wind that lifts them up and takes them away from you and you have nothing. Nothing.

Don’t give me money or cars or clothes. Give me strength to carry on. Give me the will to break the chains that hold me down. You can leave everything else behind, or in my case – in the trash. I need to set myself free from what sets me back. Do you have to throw your baggage in the garbage or is it easier if you just find someone to carry it with? My purse is heavy enough and I want nothing to drag me on the floor. The trash is over there, they collect it on Friday. Don’t waste your time. Or time will waste you.

After all this, I sat down on my bed and the horrible realization hit me like a flaming hammer… ‘what the fuck am I gonna do now?!’ There’s this moment in every person’s life when you just have to say it out loud to believe it: ‘This is a house; a building made of bricks and stones. A house where my parents live and I visit occasionally because I have nowhere to live when I go there.’

Did you say it? Good. Now pull your shit together.

Let's just say that when I had that epiphany I was probably 16 or 17. From then on... I became 'homeless'. I don’t know why I thought this time would be different. I got off the train, got in the car – no hello or how was your trip. As usual. As soon as we got home I felt exactly like the last time. He has this urge to make me feel small and insignificant. Tread me down and get it over with quicker.

I didn’t bring my laptop so my parents’ PC is in their bedroom which limits my time using it with my father’s deafening snoring. I came back with a backpack where I had stashed my weed, 2 tshirts, a pullover and several books. Living in a small town makes it extremely difficult to get properly high without being executed by your parents. But also if you have a 4-storey house with a big-ass terrace on the roof – you might think of something… weed-wise.

It was 2 pm in the afternoon which here turns the town into Deadville where all the old people, annoying babies and tired mothers try to catch a few blissful hours of sleep. And there’s the occasional stoner like me who’s anxious to fire something up, probably myself.

My dad snoring, my sister out of town and my mother getting drunk somewhere presented itself to be the perfect timing for me fulfilling my evil plan. I rolled it nicely and went to the roof. Aah, ‘the roof is on fire’ transforms into reality and the world slows down.

How high should I get to fly away from here? I’ve got no friends left here, I already avoid talking to my parents as it is and I know every street, every building by heart. Home isn’t where your heart is. My heart is in my writings, in my passions, in the books I read, the music I listen to. I leave little bits from my soul in every person I meet, I’ve given my heart to my friends because they are now my family. I’m ‘homeless’ because I feel nowehere ‘at home’. I’m alone, lonely, lonesome and on my own. And that’s okay. ‘A home’ in most people’s minds visualizes as a countryhouse with a big tree in front and a fat dog on the porch. My ‘home’ is probably in Australia, New Zealand, South Africa or under a dirty bench in the park.

I don’t know where but it’s not here.

‘There’s no place like home’ – Yeah, but I can think of at least 17 places better than your lovely home. The fear of change forbids you to explore new worlds and to open your eyes. Only people in first novels and country songs live happily ever after in their old houses back home. I’m not gonna ‘leave my heart in San Francisco’, I’d rather take it with me.

Sorry, darling, but now you must go and pack your fucking bags and leave.

You’ll thank me later.

V.