This Moment – A Writing Exercise

Right at this very moment I am sitting at a small, cute writing desk. The wind is blowing outside and you can hear its drafty song in the house and especially the window frames. It plays a pretty tune in the chimes that hang at the entrance but there is something melancholy in that sound. The leaves on the trees flutter as though nervous about the world beyond the garden which I overlook. Trucks and cars make their way through the pot-holed streets and the dust rises to fill the air. It is quietly filling this upstairs room and it smells dry and earthy. A thin layer of dust coats the keyboard even now after only two days in Mazar-e-Sharif where the desert sands covers the city like a prayer shawl. The sunlight is diffused by the haze and casts dancing shadows on the once white curtain. The coffee I am drinking is black. Just off that perfect temperature that is neither scalding nor easy to gulp, it sits to the right of my computer – an old Dell with a dead battery. Every time it starts the message that pops up reads: ‘Your battery needs to be replaced’. It’s been that ways for over a year now. Connected to an external power source it functions but it is not fast. Some would say it is obsolete. However, it can keep up with the steady plod of my fingers as I write and seems to remember my words well enough. ‘Need’ is a relative term. If the power cuts now I’ll only have about six minutes to finish my work and save this piece. What more can I say? I am getting to know the people in this house – a family of five – and am friends already with the other guest. Outside the compound is a land and culture I do not really know nor understand. This city is to be my home for the next two years. Home. A funny word I find. Will I ever feel like this is home? Will any place? I’m not sure I can remember what home used to feel like. Once it was a house shared with my family. Is it simply a place shared with others you love? Yes, but not quite that alone. Great love seems to be required for a man to settle. That might be home and I suppose that’s what I take home to be: a place where my heart is. Home is about belonging to place and people. My heart belongs no one nor to anywhere special. Except wherever I am. Lightly holding memories dear. Now I’m in Afghanistan.