Nostalgia. Some feel it when listening to a song, others as they flip through old photographs.
Me?
I feel it every time the first true cold wind of the year hits my cheeks and when the first smell of snow fills the air.
The small shivers that travel up my body as I step out into the frigid air send me back to a place that will forever own my soul. A place, which due to tragic circumstances, is held only in my heart, and has forced me to call a foreign place my home.
As I sit here, cuddled in a blanket, staring out the window at the snowflakes falling, memories flood my mind. Along with them, pain floods my soul. Every year, these same feelings come back. It's more than just the cold air and heavy blankets of snow. It's the way the wood crackles as the fire burns, the way the smell of suho meso fills the house, and the way the world slows down around us.
For me, winter holds my first memories of Bosnia. The first time I stepped foot on the soil that my parents had no choice but to escape from. The first time that I stepped foot in the family house that I only had the chance to spend 28 nights in. The first time that I met family, who we would soon have no choice but to leave behind.
For many others, winter holds their last memories of Bosnia as their home. Two very different memories, but both ones that can never be erased.
I remember that December as vividly as if it had just happened. I remember that feeling that I got as I looked into my babos face while we walked through the house that held not only his fondest memories, but also some of his worst. It was a strange feeling asking permission to walk through your own house. I remember the large amounts of snow, covering acres of land in front of us. I remember crying as I became soaked up to my hips, because our only way to reach his aunt's house was by foot. I remember the way my heart filled up when I saw my grandparents waiting on their front porch for us, and then a month later the way it broke while I watched them cry as they waved goodbye.
That was my first memorable winter in Bosnia and my last.
Every trip we made after that happened during the blistering summer months, yet not a single summer reminds me of home. It would be easy to assume that the reason winter bring me back to Bosnia is because those were my first memories of it, but I have learned that I am not alone in my feeling. My parents, my husband, my family and friends have all shared these same thoughts. We all seem to feel the same nostalgia for home with every true winter's arrival.
Maybe it's because winter here can't compare to winter back home. Maybe it's because all of our traditional meals are ideal for winter due to their rich heaviness. Maybe it's because my favorite aunt always chose to visit from Europe once the weather was cold and the snow had fallen. Maybe it's because my entire family spent their winter cooped up in my majka's living room with laughter erupting throughout the house, as we filled our bellies with hot maslenica.
Maybe it's because winter is family, and Bosnia is the mother that gave birth to us all.
Whatever the reason, every time the first scent of a true winter fills the air, I'll stop to take it in. I'll let the memories of my motherland flood my mind, as the melancholy floods my heart.
-A
suho meso-smoked beef
babo-dad
majka-grandma
maslenica-doughy deliciousness