3:15 a.m. I stare
at the ceiling. Jetlag *&%*@#$*, I grimace and turn the other side. I open
my eyes again and I know it’s not just the disturbed sleep pattern leaving me
restless. That inexplicable hollow feeling inside doesn’t come from lack of
sleep. It comes from leaving a life and people, continents behind. It comes
from being soaked in life and love and then surgically removing yourself from
it.
3:30 a.m. I think
of my friend narrating how her dog recently tore her favorite cushions. As we share
chai, brought back from India, she recounts how during a family gathering, the
dog is surrounded by lots of people, receiving love and attention all day. He
is then left by himself later and possibly confused on being alone, tears apart
the poor cushions.
Am I just this labradoodle, I wonder?
4:00 a.m. I stare
at the ceiling some more, and think of India as a bowl – a large, noisy,
chaotic, colorful bowl, filled with an overload of sounds and smells and flavors.
The only way to survive it, is to give in. To become part of the color and
chaos. To develop the lightheartedness, and sense of humor, to get through it
and to enjoy it. To even lose yourself a little to the collective whole. You don’t
choose to be in the bowl. You are already in the bowl, and in many bowls even. Your
job is to figure out how to navigate the bowl.
On the other hand, in the West, each one is a bit of an
island. Islands do come together and form beautiful patches of land. But it is
a conscious effort. These patches of land can be harmonious for they are filled
with intention, and purpose and definite direction and knowledge of where they
are headed. Proactivity and individualistic decisions are guiding forces that
steer these islands towards creating larger patches of land, that they may choose.
And if you don’t make the effort, you will always remain an
island.
I suppose, both have advantages and disadvantages and ultimately,
people are wired differently, and some may prefer bowls, with ready-made
environments, while some may prefer islands, with their vast expanse of
openness.
4:30 a.m I think
I should go downstairs and write. Hmm… seems pointless. It feels like I say similar
things over and over, in the same format even, each time I am jetlagged.
I try to remember what I have written earlier. Memory being
vague, a few ideas emerge… Of collective vs. individualistic societies and
communities in the East vs. the West.
Of being a round peg, that is now square. Which no longer
completely fits in the round hole, but is still a little too round to fit in
the square hole.
Of maybe the purpose of jetlag is to process everything we
experienced in another time zone and make sense of it in the current.
5:00 a.m. I
decide to go downstairs and cook lunch. My mother often wakes up very early,
and instead of trying to go back to sleep, she will finish cooking for the day.
This last trip, I warn her each night when I stay with her, “No pressure
cookers at 4:30 a.m., no blenders at 5 p.m…” Hmm… I had better be quiet in my cooking.
5:45 a.m. Lunch
is ready. Jetlag may not be such a bad thing after all… I make myself a cup of tea
and reach out for bakarwadi. As I put
the bakarwadi in my mouth, I am
flooded once again with musings of India.
I know that as I pack lunches and walk the dog and go about
my routine, these musings will fade away like fog in sunlight. Maybe that is
the whole point of jetlag… that you lay awake in the quiet of the night, in the
stillness of your home, and process the thoughts and emotions involved in
shifting continents, from moving from your place of origin to a new place you now
call home, of noticing round pegs in square holes…
Maybe I will feel the same each time I travel. Maybe I will
make better sense of it, after each trip. Maybe, I will learn to better process
it emotionally, with better acceptance. Maybe I will learn to treat it as a
vacation and stop wondering why returning from India, never feels like
returning from a vacation.
Or maybe I won’t. And maybe I will write the same things, in
the same format over and over again...
