When I left home over two years ago for boarding school, I never really considered the lasting impact it would have on me. I never believed my definition of home could change and would keep positively changing because of it.

Before moving into college, I already had been living the past two years of my life far from family. Because it was a nine hour drive, my family couldn't really pick me up for the weekend. I quickly became more independent and learned to make tough decisions alone. I wasn’t reprimanded into doing my work or reminded to study. I was the one who had to decide when I needed to shower, wake up, get to class, eat dinner. I had to make sure my work was turned in on time, had to manage my own my social life, and take up responsibility. Yes I would have done these things too most likely if I had stayed home. These are simple life tasks. But I know if I had stayed home, my parents would have been there constantly reminding me. I would have continued to rely too much on others. I wouldn’t have matured into the person I am.

I was nervous going home this summer. I had considered my boarding school my home and didn’t know what to expect of my new home. I changed; they changed.

I didn’t know what to really except going home for those few months. For years I had spent every summer off dancing intensively at camps for multiple weeks at a time. I was never really home for a full summer.

It was different and nice being home the entire summer. After being accustomed to forming my own schedule and living independently, not having to worry much about other’s schedules or without being told by others what I should be doing, it was weird.

I knew my boarding school had prepared me for my times here at college, but I didn’t know how it was going to prepare me for the transition home this summer.

After my first week of college, I have seen now why leaving my school for my house caused some anxiety and was odd. I was leaving home, for home.

My boarding school became my other home. My home away from the home I grew up in. I was living and doing everything with my friends. We ate every meal together, hung out, chatted every night in each other's rooms. It was home, my friends just a doorway away.

My home for the summer, and still my home, was just different from my far away home. My family was now a doorway away instead of my friends. They prefered doing different things, lived on a different schedule. There were new expectations and personalities and people had evolved.

We think of home as just being the house we grew up, the familiar neighborhood we grew up loving. But I realize home can be many places, all over the same country or world.

Being in New York City, I feel this place becoming my home. I feel comfortable, excited, happy. I’m meeting new people, having deep and interesting new conversation on topics I’ve never discussed before, and exploring the plentiful neighborhoods and streets of the city. New York is amazing and I can’t imagine ever wanting to leave this city.

I now have another home.