Home.
I’ll mouth the word to the ceiling once again: “home.” The most simple concept and term sounds so foreign to me.
Nothing has changed. The walls are still standing in the same snowy way. The curtains are just as heavy and dark in my bedroom cavern.
But it smells slightly different. Mild suspicions have crossed my eyes and turned my head through the initial forays. Was that book there when I left? Who did all my dishes? As if some low-key, floating stranger had been living here while I was gone. A gentle specter, a willowy wraith.
The solution has been to impose my will. Rather than trying to sleep through the post-tour exhaustion, I drank multiple coffees and spent as long as I wanted in the shower — there are no bandmates here anymore, knocking impatiently on the door.
In the previous twenty-four hours I’ve worn saggy trousers, left my hair knotted and let my sheets run wild. Whatever phantom animal spirit my home possesses, I intend to tame it with an unprecedented exertion of personality.
(Please don’t let my words lead you to believe that I would ever avoid true hygiene. In between marriages, my mother was once a dental hygienist. And I’m sworn to the simple principle impressed upon me long ago. Fresh breath is one of the minor keys to the universe.)