Millions around the world picked up their luggage off the conveyor belt at thousands of airports around the world that day. So many reasons stated behind those journeys for so many dreams to be satiated. So many teary goodbyes must have followed so many of those separations.

Excuses are abundant. To leave the ones who once held your hand. A phrase – ‘in the long run it will be good’ has done more harm than good for sure. You keep telling everyone that travelling is the best teacher one can have, but secretly it just draws borders between you and the ones whom you waved goodbyes to. New places and new faces reward you with new stories to savour for a moment. Until they leave a sour taste behind and act melancholy to your better past. Nostalgia is something we check in, with our luggage in every flight we board. And maybe that is why they call it baggage.

What’s worth and what is not is in hands of time to decide. And it takes things away to tell you what you had. What you owned once and could call yours. That old town, forgotten faces and childhood places makes a surprise visit in your dreams; as you sleep underneath the new blanket in your air conditioned hotel room. You see yourself chatting with your once used to be pals from hometown whom you had stopped calling years back. And then you wake up, open your eyes to a cold room and even the colder surroundings that remind you of the fact that you have already left the past and old faces behind. Far behind. You give out a sigh and close your eyes to fool yourself that you’re living a peaceful life. Secretly you feel envious of your dreaming self, which has a full access to your past.

Geography is what is wrong with this world. Only if we could build bridges that could take us to those stretched arms waiting at the other end of it. From two feet to wheels, from horse carts to trains and from trains to airplanes; we surely took a valiant leap. But at the same time they took us even farther in search of more glitter and better lands. Transitory is the meeting between two, between you and your companion along the journey. Just like ant whispering to the other member and robotically moving blindfolded towards the sugar cube.

A balance is a relative concept. But it indeed is a much needed reprise in our marathon-busy lives. A balance between the racing mettle to catch up with our goals and a restless heart longing for home.