There is no such thing.

He had left home for studies abroad about twenty years ago. Since then, he had come for brief holidays only a couple of times. The last time was about seven years ago. He had gone to school in this town, lived his younger days in an old house with a garden. During school holidays, he remembered his group of friends would play cricket under the large neem tree and they would wear down the earth in a rectangular patch by constant use. In his school final year, his parents let him move into a small room of his own in the first floor. Earlier he had slept and worked out of a common dormitory, where siblings, cousins etc. all used to share the space.

He had been a good cricketer and good in his studies and had accumulated a shelf full of prizes, cups and books. All these had been placed in that room, and were the pride of his young life. Like many teenagers, he too had stuck posters of film stars and pictures of motorcars on the wall. There were two posters, which were his favourites. One he got when he was in college, which had a nice saying in big letters, “There’s no such thing as too many friends”. The other was a picture of a big sailing ship. It was actually a reprint of an old painting done in the classical style.

His friends and he used to meet in his room and discuss, such serious matters that only teenage minds could generate. They even had the happy ‘joint studies’ sessions there. It was more having a great time than actually studying, but some studying was done.

When he left home, he had told his mother that he would come back for his trophies and books. That time never came; the books and prizes remained in that large house. On both his visits, he had promised that it would be the next time as his luggage was already overweight.

Life had gone on, he had first taken up a job in Southeast Asia and then worked in different parts of Europe before settling down in California. His kids went to school there and had never been exposed too much to India, so their home was in that part of the world. However, to him somehow his old parental house was considered home and talked about returning home someday. That was the real home in his mind, the place where he felt he really belonged. Life has so many strange twists; we can never anticipate every turn. Sometime after his second visit, must have been about five years ago, his parents decided to rent out the place and move to a smaller apartment. All their children had ‘flown the nest’ so to say; they had no need for so much space anymore. One day his father had packed his trophies in a cardboard box and all the precious books had been donated to a school for the poor.

Now after seven years, he was coming for his third visit in two decades. His parents had just sold the old house and moved city to live with his brother in Sydney Australia. He hoped to get one last glimpse of his home, as he continued to call it. This was to be a very short visit, finish some paper work check out some old friends and fly back. The day after he arrived, he took a cab to the end of the street of his home. Then he walked it until the compound. The skyline of that little road had changed, most of the old buildings had gone and most of the familiar residents had dispersed to various parts and climes. He came up to the gate and found the demolishers had already started their work. They had cut the old building like a cross section; he could therefore see the insides of some of the rooms. He walked in to the compound to get a closer look. Two walls and most of the ceiling of his old room on the first floor had been removed. He looked up and in the early morning sunlight, he could see something familiar. On the far wall was one of the old posters; the tenants had left it intact. A portion of it had been torn and it was dusty. He walked a few more steps and by craning his head he got a closer look at the poster and it now read “There is no such thing”. He smiled, took a breath with sigh, turned around on his feet and knew it was now time to go home.