Battlefield

THE suitcases sit in the living room, all packed and ready to go home. I scrub the kitchen floors and cabinets clean, strip the bed of linens, do the last laundry, take the trash out, put stuff in storage. I take one last look at the house after the close-down and somehow, I feel sad.

Every year in the spring, I am here – when the cherry blossoms appear. But this year, they somehow seem more beautiful. Perhaps, I caught them at their peak. Or perhaps, I’ve simply learned now to see everything with new perspective.

When the leaves fall, I am wistful. For some reason, I’ve always been drawn to the turning and falling of the leaves. They remind me of how fleeting everything in life is – health, wealth, youth, beauty, fame, even love.

I know I’m going to miss the peace and quiet. I’m going to miss the trees, the squirrels, the birds, even the wild rabbits that sometimes appear in the backyard – in brief, life in the burbs. I never really stopped wanting to live away from the city. When I was young, I always wanted to live in the burbs but my father, the quintessential Chinese businessman, wanted property in the heart of the city. I later tried to convince him to build a vacation home by the ocean but he said we wouldn’t have the time to go to the vacation home, anyway.

So I’ve lived in the city all my life where the cacophony from the streets is constant, where even at night, the lights burn brightly and where there is never any respite from worldly worries. It is only at dawn when I finally find some silence and space for my soul to speak.

I will miss my daily 6 kilometer-walk at dusk where I collect my thoughts, compose my columns and smile every time I see Louis’s face in every canine I meet in the neighborhood. This is what love should be like. Always. Now, I’m back to my sedentary life- style. And it so sucks. I want to take a walk but each time I look at the clock, it’s moving so fast, I feel I’m going to be stuck behind my desk forever. And the stifling heat and humidity just make me want to strip and jump into the ocean.

Upon arrival, I get this massive headache that lasts till the next day. I am home. Nothing can be more conspicuous than a migraine that I am back on the battlefield.

While away, the girls ask how I am. “Happy,” I tell them, “so happy I don’t want to go back.” “Oh no,” they tell me, “you have to come back because we’re going to miss you and you’re going to miss us too.”

“Of course, I’ll be back because I love you.” This is what love should be like. Always. And so I’m back – on the battlefield.

Don’t mistake my whining for a lack of love for my amazing life. I love my life. But this doesn’t mean I can’t live better. Less noise. More space. Less stress. More chill. I like my job as commander of the battlefield. But this doesn’t mean I can’t be a beach bum for a weekend. Or two weekends. Or forever.