The Road Home

Recently, a friend e-mailed me a question:" I’m sitting here looking out my window at the family across the street and it started me thinking about something. Knowing that you are in the same position, I was wondering your thoughts. How did/do you feel about being in a city where you had/have no family or friends who know your history?"

Her question got me thinking. What is home? Is it where you grew up? Is it a physical place? Is it where your mail is delivered? Is it like "Cheers-Where everyone knows your name?"...or is home something else?

I was once asked to describe the rooms in my house and I wrote:

The sun and sky on the walls
Windows that show the yard
Paintings of nature and animals
with magic, bookcase in the living room
Cookbooks lining kitchen cupboards
Soothing bedroom and bath

This describes the place that I call home but it is not my home. My home is within me. It is who I am when I am fully engaged. It is who I am when I am happy. It is who I am when I am sad. Homing is coming back to myself, back to my intuition. It is who I am.

My history has shaped me. It has contributed to who I am, but I define myself and continue to shape my own beliefs. The past is largely irrelevant, especially in terms of home, especially in terms of going home in the holiday season. College students, young professionals, recently married couples are not returning home when they take trains, planes and cabs to the places they grew up. Thomas Wolfe's famous American novel "You Can't Go Home Again" relentlessly and eloquently drives home the point that nothing stays the same. So, even I as change and grow, I am still me and my home is within. Aristophanes said "A man's home is wherever he prospers". And so I am on a continual road home because I prosper when I am most myself.

Namaste,
Ginny