Home is an incredibly confusing concept. As word, it is used
to describe the place in which we live. Our apartment. Our house. Our cardboard
box on the sidewalk of Avenue A. Weather we have recently moved in and are
still without furniture (or pots and pans) or have lived in the same house for
more than 20 years, we use the same word to describe it. But if we sit down to
really consider what the word means to us and where that definition might
actually hold truth, people rarely seem to think of the place that they sleep
at night.
My parents moved into their house shortly before I was born.
While my mother was pregnant I believe. I lived there for 22 years. Experienced
all of my growing pains (or, considering my height, lack thereof), my first
steps, my first solid food, and all of my first days of school. I remember when
I went to college in Phoenix, Arizona. 3 months into the first semester, I
referred to my dorm as home and it struck me as odd but comforting. My friends
and I had been out, celebrating our freedom as college freshman, and it was
probably after 3 in the morning when we were all tired and I stated that it was
time to go home. Somehow, the concept of where my heart was had transferred
from my parents tiny house in Simsbury to the dorm where my make-shift family
lived. That was 5 years ago and things have changed since then. My biological
family has grown older and further apart. I have become independent, at least
as far as living is concerned.
I moved to New Haven and into my now ex-boyfriend’s
apartment 2 years ago. It was a little soon in our relationship but we were
very much in love and I spent most of my time there anyway. The closet was
small and he did not offer me a drawer but it was the first time in a long time
that I could come home each night really wanting to be where I was. Going back
to that apartment felt like entering a place where I was safe and loved. A lot
has happened since then. I am living in my first lease. A one bedroom with no
furniture and 2 of the world’s friendliest kittens. I have only been in this
apartment a week and it doesn’t quite feel like home yet. I have a family here
in New Haven. A few extremely close friends including my ex-boyfriend.
Sometimes we fight, or get a little annoyed with each other, but when one of
crashes his car at 5 a.m., the other will always answer his call. I still spend
a lot of time in that apartment and it still feels strange. Not really like a
home, but somewhere I want to be. That’s the interesting place about home. It
never seems to last in one specific place and though we may have a place to
sleep and eat, we may still consider ourselves homeless. Home may be where the
heart is, but when that becomes lost, where can we go to feel safe?
