Home, while a place with coordinates, is more of a feeling and a concept than anything else. At the end of the day, it’s the space we create for ourselves, constantly hoping to find it wherever we go. It is a feeling of fierce, unwavering love from a group of people who simply are figuring it out together. And when you’re 20, figuring it out is a b*tch. Home is the people who you surround yourself with people so that at the end of the day you might not feel so alone.
August 2013 marked the end of my life at the only home I had ever known. I was about to leave behind my friends who for so long were my whole world, my parents and just about everything else. I was leaving for college- a mere 2-hour plane ride but you truly would have thought I was going to a remote island where I would never be able to contact anyone again. Ever. I was terrified. I sobbed myself to sleep the night before my departure. I cried at the airport, I cried at the hotel as my parents tried to console me. Then, I moved in.
Like ripping off a Band- Aid, I was forced into a dorm of 7 strangers. They came from California to Connecticut and I was by any definition, uncertain. How was this supposed to work, were we just supposed to share our life stories as we brushed our teeth? We embarked on the typical trials and tribulations of an all American college experience. We learned to make food, and make friends and make bad choices and good choices and we slept through classes and we didn’t study for exams we wish we had and, we lived. We didn’t always thrive but we survived that year together and throughout it all, we grew up.
And all the while on my way to gaining independence, I gained something else. I gained people, people who have the kindest and most genuine hearts I have ever known or expect to know again. The days and weeks and months passed and I learned about these people who not so long ago were just Facebook profiles to me. I learned about their challenges and about their convictions and hopes and dreams. And just like that, I found a second home.
These people have now become a part of me, their hearts engrained in my own- they are my own tiny family. They are the group of people whom I want to be with in my hardest hours, at 5 am when we are up for no reason at all. They are the people I am so fearful to lose. They are the people who bring Gatorade to class when I’m taking a quiz hungover. They are the people who listen to problems without moving to change them or fix them. They just want to listen and share in the pain and the joy and the laughs. They are the people who bully me into going out even when Greys Anatomy, sweatpants and a whole gallon of ice cream sounds like Heaven. They are the reason I got 0/3 on most of my British Literature quizzes and they are the reason I feel at home 730 miles away from my house.
Second semester junior year is scary as all Hell, you have a year and a half left to figure out what you’re doing with your life. We all have this unspoken fear that consumes us, what could be better than this? Living with your best friends, and everyone else 10 minutes away- that will all be gone in a year. We will be all over the country, in low paying jobs, in crappy apartments and all the while, alone. But that’s the thing about home; it is something so illusive and intangible that you can take it with you. These people have become a part of you and you, them.
Thankful is an understatement, really it’s more like honored. I am so honored to be a part of your lives; I cannot wait to see how you change the world. I am honored to know you and to call you my people. You are each filled with possibility- endless amounts and even in the moments that you don’t see that, know that I do. Home truly is wherever I am with you.
