I love college; I really do. It has given me freedom, opportunities, friendships, challenges, and so many memories. However, that being said, there is something about coming home that is just—as the saying goes—sweet. I know in the traditional sense not everyone's "home" is something they look forward to visiting or returning to, but the way I see it, home doesn't have to be a specific place like a house or apartment, it can be the people that make it home or even a feeling you get. Home for me has always been a place where I feel safe, loved, welcomed, and happy. While l look forward to cuddling my dog and sleeping in my own bed, it's really the people and how they make me feel that really makes my house a home for me.
Beyond the four walls of my house that I come home to, my hometown is also a place I consider my home. I grew up exploring what my hometown has to offer with my family and friends. From the zoo, botanical gardens, frozen custard, to the park my brother and I would ride our bikes to, and the city that I grew up in is also a part of what home means to me. Home is a comfort, familiarity, relationships that run deep, and where a part of my heart will always be.
College has become my second home as each spring semester comes and goes. It even comes up on my Google maps as my home address now. It's where I spend the majority of the year sleeping, eating, and getting my mail. I have my college hangouts just like I have my hometown ones. While campus can't replicate the house I grew up in, with each passing year the familiarity increases and the bonds I've formed with people continue to strengthen.
It's only taken three years but the line between home and school has become a little blurry. In both places, I have people that I consider family—some by blood and some by choice. Both groups of people care about, love, and support me and that goes both ways. While at college I have a freedom that, even at the age of 21, I still haven't seemed to have completely received at home. At home, I have my mom's home cooking, my dad's jokes, and time to bond with my brother.
Rather than compare and try to find what the other lacks, I like to look at my home and school life as, my home and my home away from home. If I'm being completely honest, that's what college has become to me. A home. It won't ever quite measure up to the original, but it's pretty darn close. It's become a home because I've allowed it to. I've let people in and I've put myself out there. So while college is my home away from home, nothing will ever be quite as sweet as my childhood home sweet home.
