Lately I’ve been moving around a lot. I still technically live in the house I grew up in, but if I look at a calendar, I’ve been spending more time away than actually there. It might be more accurate to say I live in a dorm, or a guest house, or an apartment or maybe even an airplane. I feel like I’m living in limbo, never really settled, always just waiting for the next move. Always waiting for the next place I’ll be calling “home” for however long it lasts. A few nights ago I found myself asking the question: what happens when “home” is no longer actually home?
As far as I can tell, we all want to feel like we belong somewhere. We want to belong at our jobs, at school, in our neighborhoods, wherever. As much as we love our pet fish or dogs or dragons, we have to leave the house eventually, and it’s nice to feel welcomed when we do. But at the same time, living in limbo means it can be hard to lay roots because the deeper our roots go, the more painful it is when they’re uprooted. I know the feeling. I’m sure you do too.
It’s so easy to start to feel lost or to be afraid of making connections. Sometimes it’s easier to live out of a suitcase and never form emotional attachments, because never allowing ourselves to grow connected to a place makes the getaway so much easier. But never allowing a place to start to feel like home can just perpetuate feelings of… emptiness. Disconnect. Somehow always being lost. While that may be intentional, should we really be so insistent on remaining disengaged? No house means no ties? That can’t be it.
So maybe the point of growing up is learning the difference between a house and a home. This constant moving around, trying to find our place amidst the chaos around us, leads us to accept that home is no longer a set of wood and nails, but the ability to be at home with ourselves. To walk down a crowded street and find contentment in the perfect cup of coffee from the shop around the corner, or in naming the goats the city hired to “mow” the huge field (lookin' at you, Walla Walla), or maybe in watching the lighting of the city’s Christmas tree in December. Whether we become the vagabond or the homebody, at some point we have to learn to be at home with ourselves – regardless of our surroundings.
To be honest, I don’t know where I belong. I don’t know where I will end up, and I don’t know who I’ll be there with. But I’m realizing, no matter what age I am, that that’s ok. My map is being drawn one day at a time, and I have the freedom to go wherever it takes me. Not knowing where the “end” is means if I end up somewhere for 10 days, 10 months, or 10 years, I am not stuck. Where I belong can be wherever I need it to be, and I can always find a way to call it home.
