The chilly clings to my cheeks like a lover reluctant to let go, a crisp whisper of winter wrapping itself round me as I step out of Newark Liberty Worldwide Airport into the biting daybreak of February 7. The air is sharp, slicing via material and flesh, a blade of reminiscence and second intertwined. It’s minus six levels Celsius, however with the wind’s depraved whip, it feels colder nonetheless. And but, I’m heat. Heat with the enjoyment of arrival, with the information of return, with the previous however ever-new feeling of being dwelling.
House. A phrase weighted with longing, layered with loss, stitched along with the threads of time and tide. New York, New York Metropolis, Manhattan, New York State, even the shadows and skylines of New Jersey — all of it dwelling, all of it acquainted, all of it overseas. That is the land that when unfurled earlier than me like an uncharted map, a dreamscape of daring and need, a promise wrapped in pavement, risk, and the perpetual hum of ambition. I used to be 20 after I first arrived, carrying a coronary heart filled with starvation and arms empty however keen. The town opened its arms to me — not with tenderness, however with an exciting toughness, a problem wrapped in neon and noise. It educated me, elevated me, made me complete, made me hungry, made me.
And now, three months away, and I’m again. If somebody had been watching me now, standing on the curbside within the dim early gentle of February, they may suppose I had gained a million-dollar lotto, grinning ear to ear, cheek to cheek, tooth to tooth. The town pulls me again into its fold, the best way a tide reclaims the shore, the best way an previous music rekindles forgotten feelings. That is the land of the footloose and fancy-free, the soil the place so many have planted their goals, at the same time as these goals at the moment are uprooted by the callous cruelty of a nation fraying at its seams.
At the moment’s America, with Trump’s shadow nonetheless forged lengthy and looming, will not be the one I fell for. It’s an America that’s deporting goals, driving out hope, dimming the beacon that when burned so shiny. It’s a place the place partitions rise sooner than alternatives, the place worry festers within the cracks of communities as soon as sure by perception. And but, within the eyes of my Uber driver — a person from Cuba, who nods at me within the rear-view mirror as he weaves us via the highways of a rustic that will by no means absolutely declare him — I see one thing I recognise. I see the identical spark that sparkled inside me all these years in the past, the identical unstated settlement that we’re right here not only for ourselves, however for the others we left behind, the others who look ahead to information, for proof, for a promise fulfilled.
The wheels hum in opposition to the asphalt as my thoughts drifts again, many years folding upon themselves like previous letters tucked in a drawer. I used to be a pupil on the Faculty of Visible Arts, studying not simply graphic design, artwork historical past and images however the structure of ambition, the scaffolding of survival. There was no sprawling campus, no manicured greens, no lazy afternoons on college lawns. My campus was town itself, its galleries and gutters, its museums and midnight diners, its rhythm of rush and restlessness. By day, I labored on the Metropolitan Museum of Artwork reward retailer, a inventory boy stacking cabinets, a silent observer within the temple of treasures. By evening, I used to be in every single place directly — soaking within the symphony of sirens and road performers, of poetry slams and protests, of underground jazz golf equipment and overcooked bodega sandwiches eaten underneath flickering streetlights. I used to be younger and town was mine.
The town taught me to work, to need, to attend. From inventory boy to supervisor, from supervisor to retailer supervisor, I climbed, not with calculation however with the sheer drive of displaying up, of claiming sure, of entering into roles I hadn’t deliberate for however in some way made my very own. I lived in Montclair then, calling automotive service every morning, driving to Brief Hills like a prince with no kingdom, studying easy methods to navigate America in a method they don’t educate in lecture rooms. I used to be Indian, I used to be immigrant, I used to be intuition, I used to be ambition. I by no means misplaced my accent, by no means shed my pores and skin to suit into one other. I used to be, and all the time could be, the sum of two worlds, stitched collectively by starvation and historical past.
Thirty years in America have made me who I’m, and but, I don’t belong solely to it. I feel like an American, transfer like a Manhattanite, breathe, pause, dream like a New Yorker. And but, part of me nonetheless aches for the house I left, for the style of Bari Matar cooked by my mom, for the scent of okra crisping in a pan, for the heat of Delhi’s smoggy sunsets bleeding into the bougainvillea exterior our previous home.
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Bari Matar. A winter dish, an unbelievable dish, an embodiment of time and custom, a style of rooftops kissed by the Punjab solar. It begins with dried lentils — hulled and cut up urad dal —mashed with candy, golden pumpkin pulp, sure by the fiery chunk of black pepper, then sun-dried on terraces the place the winter air crisps them into hardened nuggets of nourishment. These sun-dried dumplings, humble but highly effective, are then simmered in a gravy wealthy with slow-sweated onions and sun-ripened tomatoes, their pure sweetness coaxed out by the alchemy of warmth and time. Freshly shelled inexperienced peas, plump with the season’s final whispers, are scattered into the broth, their verdant pop a counterpoint to the deep umami of the dumplings. The flavours constructed, layer upon layer, a symphony of spice, smoke, and slow-cooked consolation.
And but, at the same time as I sat in Delhi, breaking up a flaking, crisp haath ki roti, mopping up the wealthy, velvety Bari Matar, I used to be already craving a slice of New York pizza, a Sicilian sq., the chunk of tomato in opposition to the chew of dough, the tang of cheese and reminiscence interwoven.
By no means absolutely right here, by no means absolutely there.
I arrive in America this morning, clueless if I’ve a house right here anymore, and but, I really feel at dwelling. As a result of the wanderer that I’m, I reside in wanderlust. My head finds only a floor to relaxation on for just a few hours each evening, and in that transient pause between waking and dreaming, I belong. House will not be a GPS location.
“Primary apni talash mein hoon, mera koi rahnuma nahin hai.
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Woh kya dikhayenge raah mujhko, jinhain khud apna pata nahin hai.”
I’m anchored wherever I’m, as a result of I’m all the time looking — for myself, for the richer, newer, larger model of me that I do know exists simply past the horizon of in the present day.
Dhobi ka kutta, na ghar ka na ghat ka.
I belong to each, and to neither.
Kabir as soon as wrote:
“Chalti chakki dekh kar diya Kabira roye,
Do patan ke beech mein sabut bacha na koye.”
(“Watching the grinding stones, Kabir laments,
In between two stones, nothing stays intact.”)
And but, I stay. I’m neither crushed nor consumed. I don’t search a single place to name mine, as a result of I carry my belonging inside me.
Rumi jogs my memory: “Don’t grieve. Something you lose comes spherical in one other kind.”
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And so I transfer, time and again, for so long as the street stretches earlier than me.
