“ All That Matters” Yesterday I was scrolling Instagram and I saw a reel. The algorithm of the reel was bit empathetic, and in an emotional kind of way. It said that maybe in next life we shouldn’t leave our home for a better life and that’s when it hit me.

I came from a big city but not as big as the tech-cities like Mumbai, Delhi, Bangalore, etc. So to start a better life and do something big, initially i have to leave my hometown and that’s what I am doing right now. I am studying in one of the colleges in Chandigarh, which is 5–6 hours away from my home, which means I can’t travel daily, so I am staying in hostel. Though hostel life is good, it teaches you different things and you meet some of the best people of your life their but all that matters is your family isn’t with you. I have been living in hostel from a year now and I have become used to it, that you can barely make time to go to your house, even there are some days where you can’t even call and tell your parents that how your day went because you’re all just exhausted. You just can’t be a part of those not so normal family gatherings, because you just stay far from home. Mine is only 5 hours but there are people who really live miles away, very far, even on weekends I do go to my home but those people in the last one year had hardly gone 4–5 times, and I have lost a count of how many times I went to visit my family.

The actual thing is that all these distances doesn’t make sense, if your’e far or near from home. The only thing that matters is that you cannot go back easily. You know during the school time at dispersal, the last bell rang and we all rushed out of the classes to go back home, no restrictions, nothing, just us and the bus driver who’s going to take us to our home, and now there are all procedures to follow just to go back and meet your own family whom you hadn’t seen in a while. You have to come up with valid reasons for why are you going to your own home in the sake of procedures, get it signed from HOD, then hostel warden and she’ll confirm it from your parents that if you are saying the truth or not. Sounds Funny! but that the sad truth about adult life. As kids we were all excited about being adults chasing our dreams but little did we know that these dreams of ours will cost us something precious. Its easy for the people to say that you’re living in a different city, enjoying your life, no one to stop you from anything but only we people know that how it feels, to skip your meals daily because you couldn’t get the time to eat, how it feels that instead of going out on weekends and enjoying with your friends you have to do all the things of your house alone because you don’t have anyone.

A girl asked me that isn’t it difficult to live without your family, in a city where none knows you, don’t you remember them? I said that of course I do, in the start all will do but later they will get so busy in their work that they won’t even remember that they need to remember anyone. It’s just that there’s a difference between house and home, house is a place where you can live, but home is something which needs love, needs our people, you cannot call your home to anyone but only to those who really mean it to you and that’s the truth. Once you leave a place you never truly be there. Writer, thinker, and telling different lively stories. The art of noticing people, especially when they are at their lowest. trishamahajan162@gmail.com