Being Away

It doesn't feel like I've been away. I left Paris on a clear afternoon, landed in Singapore on  Sunday, slid into my dad's car and right back into the life I led before I went chasing my previously elusive dreams in Europe. It was a Sunday, just like every other Sunday I had lived in Singapore. The family went to church, had lunch then came to pick me up.

It doesn't feel like I've been away. I stood in front of the house fiddling with the lock and key with motions still second nature, and walked through the door just like I would have on any other day. Nothing's changed. I slept in the bed I hadn't touched for five months and it felt as if I had been sleeping on it all the other days that I wasn't.

It doesn't feel like I've been away. The humidity embraced me like a long-lost lover and the heat merely reminded me of the scorching sun of a European summer. It's actually cooler here. I took the public transport like I have been the past many years and still mixed up certain places on the MRT line like I have been the same many years.

It doesn't feel like I've been away. I jumped to hang my towel on the overhead bamboo poles out of habit when I returned, turned the difficult doorknobs with practiced ease, skipped up the stairs without looking at the steps, left the curtains half-drawn before I realised it and automatically checked the letterbox too.

It doesn't feel like I've been away. Everything came back too quickly and too easily. I was hoping it'd be a little harder, so that I'd get to know my home again in a slightly different light, perhaps. But nay, everything came right back like I'd only been gone for less than a day.

It doesn't feel like I've been away. I would've liked to miss home a little; to feel a yearning for something comfortable and familiar. No such luck, however. I did wonder about this apparent callousness of heart and arrived at a certainty that I'd be going back. And soon enough too. So I focused on my being there, in Europe, and chose to Live to my heart's content before I was pulled back.

It doesn't feel like I've been away. The day I left five months ago still remains a fresh memory. It just feels as if I just walked right out of a dream and back into reality. Not sure if I like this perspective.