It was also Our Home

One of our colleagues invited us for their farewell "party". Well... it's not a farewell farewell, but it is merely about moving from an old place to a new place. I can still see and meet them every week at the new place, but that is not the point I like to raise in this short story.

For some people, house is just a house, the place to keep warm or cold depending on the weather. I could understand how difficult the moving processes are for some people (including me, probably). I should learn a lot from them about their decisions to “leave” the house. That is not an easy decision. Believe me, it is not. But, that is about life, my friend. Just like a traveling wave, sometimes up and down, back and forth. You can not just stop in the middle, you have to go further and keep writing a new history of life.

The years I knew them are nothing compared with the memory that the house could tell.

For you my “Buddies”, Erwin and Dewi, that place is not only yours (well technically it’s yours, you are the one who paid the mortgage and all bills :-) , but in spirit, it is also ours. Don’t care with other people said. For us, that is not just a house. That is our home. The house has something special for us, in fact to all of us. Hurricane Rita said Amen to that. Our sisters and brothers, who have been at Texas A&M, would love to support the statement. Faris (Willy)’s childhood was there. What else? O..ya… The place we could stay and welcomed us anytime we visited this small town. There is no way to just wipe so many memories off that were built along with the house. Could you? Would you? I wish I could write a long story about the house but it were too many, my friend. Too many....

You may say this story express my personal sentiments. As a friend, whatever the decision you have chosen, I believe it comes after so many deliberations and iterations. Nothing I can do but pray and support. May Allah bless your decision and make your new house as a new home to continue your next journey. (Prahoro Nurtjahyo, Tuesday, 19 December 2006)