Over the course of a month-long winter break back home, I never completely unpacked my suitcase. It sat in the corner of my room, a mangled mess, as I picked out the clothes I wanted to wear that day from its stack. I only filled one drawer out of the many in my room with my belongings. My closet was mostly empty, and I kept my items separate from my parents’ so they would not get confused when it was time to leave. Though this may seem bizarre, and like I did not make myself “at home” in my own house, I was not the only college kid to do this. Students everywhere posted on social media that they, too, were in this predicament: able to be home for a while, but not feeling the need to fully unpack. Why? may be the first question someone would ask, like my parents asked me day-in and day-out when looking at my suitcase. It was not until recently that I realized I did this because my childhood house was no longer my only home.
What is a home? Many say it is where the heart is. Others may twist this and joke that it is where the wifi automatically connects. If you are one of the millions of college students across the country who live on your campus, then you realize how odd your sense of home can become. For a good chunk of the year, you live away from your childhood residence, with your peers, in a room that you pay thousands for a semester. You may call your parents every day or every week, joke about how you miss the “home cooking,” and long for the breaks that come with a new term so you can sleep in your own bed. However, going home for a college student can feel like a “welcome back” rally with an expected send-off party in a week or so. During the course of the school year, students become passersby in the place they grew up for nearly two decades. Unless it is summer break, the most you are at “home” is a few weeks over the holiday season, and even then college is awaiting your return from the second you step off campus to leave. This does not mean that the place you grew up is not your home, but it does indicate the change in your connection to that place.
The idea that moving on campus makes a student lose a sense of home may seem strange to some, but it is not a far-fetched feeling. Home is usually the place where you have the deepest and best connections with others in that area, whether its a city or a neighborhood, but over time, a college campus becomes that. Having people you enjoy being around in a space together can make any place a home, and this easily occurs on college campuses. A student sees their friends and peers more than their family and hometown friends, and soon makes those similar connections with the new people in their lives. For about nine months out of the year, these interactions, along with physically being in a residence hall, help to make a campus a home. This does not negate the other home you grew up in, but it can lead to making a distinction of what you expect from each space. From one, you may look forward to catching up with loved ones in your favorite local restaurant. From the other, it can be the desire to explore that makes you feel at home.
Going back to your old town during college breaks can be odd. There is the flood of nostalgia from being away and then returning that overcomes you. There can also be the overwhelming mixed feeling of change. The physical distance makes a childhood home seem distant, but the emotional distance affects this, as well, since a lot can change about a person or place in a few months. Though some of us may always call our house growing up “home,” a shift in belonging does occur during the initial period of leaving. I always feel “at home” when I go back to my hometown over breaks, but there is a part of me that exists on campus that considers the college setting to be “home,” too. The idea of home varies from person to person, but finding a place that you feel connected to is the most important part to building this concept.
