Home sweet home. Computer sweet computer. Broadband sweet broadband. But most of all bed sweet bed. O how I’d missed our bed. Somewhere between annoying Zeinab Sisters in Imam Khomeini airport mistaking my lavashak (dried fruit pure) for hash, drinking lukewarm coffees, being trapped in a plane with a woman who had emptied a whole bottle perfume on herself (this was so bad that for the fist time in my life I was actually thankful when another one of my fellow passengers let one go), falling sleep curled up and freezing on metal chairs in Baku airport and the two hour bus journey from Gatwick to Oxford, I had totally lost the will to live but crawling into our soft, warm bed last night, made all of that go away. It was one of the most pleasurable experiences of my life. Twelve hours of asleep and several pieces of toast with cups of tea and coffee later, I’m starting to feel normal again.

It’s both nice and sad to be back. I cried this morning and I’ve had a lump in my throat that changes size depending on what I’m doing or thinking of. Pulling out a bag of dried dill left over from my mum’s dill and broad beans meatballs; the lump gets Big. Watching an episode of Creature Comforts; it gets small. Seeing a piece of unpublished writing by my dad that he gave to me to keep; Big. Reading it; very small. Getting into my prison style pyjamas and lying on our sofa with Kamyar in his favourite shirt with the elbow areas missing; small. Seeing my dead plants; Big.
It’s ok to be sad though and I don’t mind it really because I know it’ll go away in a couple of days and I’ll be right as rain.
Stay tuned for my report on Iran that I will post in a few days time.