This Strange Stage Of Parenting.

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I had gone to bed that night hoping for a restful sleep. It was a Friday night which meant no drop off the following morning. My children all go to different schools and the toil of school runs sometimes wears me out. At around 2 AM, I heard a knock on my bedroom door. It was my daughter. “Umm, I don’t feel well. Can you take me to the hospital or call the doctors?”, she said.

A stream of light from the corridor followed her as she walked through the darkness of my room. My room was in total darkness. I like my room immersed in darkness for a deep healthy sleep. As she walked in, I asked her to switch the light on. With the light on, I saw a shivering young lady as pale as day and I watched as she struggled to explain how she felt. ” My chest hurts and I can’t breathe well. It hurts when I breathe” The sleepiness in me vanished and nerves in my brain connected in a multifaceted version. Indeed, the strange stage of parenting is in full swing.

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A Place Called Home

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I watched as the air hostess pushed the food trolley down the aisle. The second meal was served on the 6-hour journey. The air hostess stopped beside each row of seats and handed out the professionally packed turkey ham sandwiches with a smile before asking for the passengers’ choice of drink.

When she got to my row, I asked if there was a vegetarian option. She paused and applied the brake to the food trolley with her feet before replying, “No” with her eyes hovering over me. She then asked, “Did you pre-order a vegetarian option?”. I was a bit puzzled not knowing there was a pre-ordering system in place as regards airline meals. I replied in negative both with my voice and facial expression.

The next question the air hostess asked left me unsettled. “Do you want me to pre-order your meal for when you’re returning home?” This question caught me unaware, I paused for a few seconds, millions of neurons connected in my head, and then I replied spontaneously, “I am going back home”. She cast one final glance at me and ruminated over my statement, she then released the break and moved on to the next row without saying a word.

I pondered on the word “HOME”. For whatever reason I didn’t understand what home meant for a brief fleeting moment. Where is HOME? I chewed on this question for the rest of the journey. HOME! WHERE IS HOME? Have I been labelling the wrong place as home? Is the place I called home a home to me? What constitutes home? Where is home?

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