#i chortled like a hefty baron when putting it in

[neblina-a-blin]

homesick.

day 15 of the july writing challenge brings you one chonky boi! it features storms, art, and that one primative feeling i had as a child. also maybe some miracles.

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Frankly, I never believed in inspiration and downright hated how fellow students talked about it, as did some professors. It’s the attributing my work to something intangible that grinds me; when it was my own hands blistering from new paint brushes, and the endless hours of study before touching the canvas. Art might seem like a miracle to people who don’t do it often enough, but those of us who chose to get into debt for the sake of art school have no such luxury.

But, however you want to put it, I was in a slump and just in time for my final project. I was tired, worn out, and absolutely ruined by sleepless nights and unsteady nerves. That’s when I was unofficially diagnosed with an art block, forced to take a leave of absence that I really could not afford, and sent to 'soak up some life' or 'take a vacation'. Financially the farthest I would have been able to get is my hometown, to be needled with questions I absolutely dreaded to answer. So I chose the comfort of my cramped studio apartment. After a week of isolation and mistaking one too many rinse cups for coffee mugs and vice versa, I figured a change of scenery would work better. Luckily, there were many public access museums to choose from.

It was like being a patch of bare desert a few feet away from waterfalls. Masterpieces displayed everywhere and bright-eyed prospective students looking ready to lick the paint off of them from admiration. I picked the most shady creaky bench next to Botticelli and pulled out my sterile-clean sketchbook.

Half an hour into what I can only describe as aimless doodling, a person sat beside me. I did not register anyone at first, it was the subtle smell of sea salt and musk that made me aware of him. I looked up to see that he was even less aware of my presence, his eyes adrift and longing. Tight curls, olive skin, and yet he had a strange coloring to him; when you focused on his features, the space around him darkened. Like he was the centre, and the rest of the room his dim-lit stage.

We did not get to talking at first, but one way or another, we eventually did. He had an accent that I could not quite place and a strange manner of speaking. He exuded the airs of somewhere far away, but I never got the courage to ask where he was from. He looked confused and troubled deeply by it, but his politeness never allowed it to spill over. In him, there was a very particular type of sadness, the one you learn to notice only if you have been through it, too. It was like a calamity erupting beneath a gentle, kind face.

He was homesick. 

I knew that by the way he spoke of his siblings just a little too soon for a chit chat, and called me his friend without being prompted. He also expressed worry as to whether he was taking up my time, isn't there someone waiting for me? I politely established that no, there was no one waiting for me, here, at home, or otherwise. I was a free bird. My awkward chuckle bothered him, like he could not understand it. He asked whether I have ever seen the true face of the sea.

“Unless that's a funny way to describe feeding seagulls some fries, then no.”

“Oh, it is relentless, friend. It knows no mercy, however may you beg for one."

“That's…” I paused, thinking of how to respond. This was my first human interaction in a long time and I knew it was not going swimmingly, "scary."

"It is. It is frightening to the bone. It will forever touch your heart with your own impotence. You would not come to forget it."

Despite being at a loss for words, I was forgiving of his nonsense. Sometimes people are in conversation with themselves, and you happen to be a witness. I found myself in these situations a lot back then.

"Yet... being embraced in the face of it,'' he continued. ''Being huddled in the presence of a storm, is the truest home I have ever known."

He said no more. It felt like he could not articulate ways of asking for help. I did not know how to step over that boundary, to reach over and offer that help. But with every silent minute passing between us, I found myself wanting to do it more and more.

The voice on the speakers announced that the museum will be closing soon. It was like a bell tolling, commencing our separate departures. Before I could find the words to say goodbye, my companion was gone, leaving me with more questions than prior to meeting him.

The many times I'd come back, I'd never ran into him since. Other people sitting beside me on the tiny creaking benches were hardly as memorable. My conversation with the man played out in my head so much I started to forget the parts. I tried to remember the structure of his face, but it would often dissolve, as if splashed across with water.

My regret over not having helped him started to fizzle out, and I was returning to the fruitless desert where I’d been before. Some days the pencil barely scratched the paper, and I was so bored I had to pick up the museum’s audio guide just to keep me company. His face returned to me soon enough after that. The interplay between bright and dark finally clued me in on a connection with Rembrandt. 

I dropped the pencil I had chewed the top off of.

''The legendary Isabella Stewart Gardner heist remains unsolved, with thirteen paintings missing. Their current whereabouts are unknown, and the museum is lacking some of its most treasured jewels,'' toneless voice in the earphones continued.

I rushed to another room, where the harrowingly empty frame was mounted. It felt like being in a gravesite. The lackluster wallpaper stared right through you. The golden plated square was the eye, and the vanished painting its lost pupil. The image of the wayward painting was on nearby leaflets. I knew it in a way I could never ever know any other.

''Among the thirteen stolen masterpieces is Rembrandt's only seascape..."

The Storm on the Sea of Galilee.

I smacked myself on the forehead for not connecting the dots sooner, as if it would have been rational for me to come to this conclusion on my own. I was once again haunted by the homesick face of that man, the weariness from pain softening his eyebrows and mouth, as the finest of brushwork. 

I rushed out of the museum, cupping my feelings like I would hold holy water in my hands had I been religious. It was like a miracle visiting a commoner, it was like being touched on the heart with omnipotence. I unlocked my dusty apartment, paced past the empty pizza boxes and unfolded laundry, to where my second-hand easel stood. 

That day I chose the colors of a storm, and being lost but not forgotten.