Home

Sometimes it seems that I am always far from home. I have a three different homes and I don’t mean houses.

Home is where the heart is. Home sweet home. You can never go home. There’s no place like home. We buy homes, we build homes and today, we even flip homes.

I have lived three important chunks of my life in three very different places – homes A, B and C. Each place is special to me for different reasons. Home A was the site of my crazy, frolicsome youth. Home B was where I learned about independence and became an adult. Home C – I got to make my mark on the world. The physical divide between these three locales is big – big enough to make frequent visits problematic and expensive.

The concept of home is interesting. It can be a place but it can also be anything that gives us a feeling of security and happiness. Who would argue with that? Mom’s cooking, your favorite hangout, those friendships carved in stone that can never be replicated in a different time and place.

According to Webster home can be your native habitat. That makes sense to me. My time in Home B was relatively short compared to the others but I get a special feeling there, hearing everyone speak my parents’ language. The language I knew as an infant and toddler was the one I abandoned as a rebellious teenager. Now a sentimental adult looking for a connection to my heritage, I wonder if it’s a psychological throwback to being in the womb.

Some days I don’t know how to deal with homesickness. If I am there I cannot be here. If I am here I cannot be there. I cannot be here, there and everywhere – can I? My family and childhood friends want me there. My lust for success wants me here. My romantic, sentimental side would find an engineer to build me a Star Trek transporter so I could zip around everywhere.

If home is where the heart is mine is hopelessly fragmented.

Me? I prefer to go with my favorite Emily’s view on home: “Where thou art - that - is Home". I will make my home, here – there- everywhere I go and I will take my fragmented heart with me.