When I am asked, “where is home?” I never know what to answer. Is home where I currently reside? Is home where my parents live? Is home where I grew up? All these places hold different meanings to me and the asker of the question.
Most of the time when people ask, “where is home?” they mean, “were do your parents live?” Technically I haven’t lived with my parents for over four years, but that is where they assume I hold my ties with home. Ask much as I love my parents, they are no longer my home.
Some of the time when people ask, “where is home?” they mean “where did you grow up?” That is a very complicated answer, since I spent the early part of my ‘growing up’ life in one city, the middle in a suburb and the last in the ‘city’ of the country. Which answer do they want? Would it be acceptable to say all three?
Almost none of the time when I am asked, “where is home?” does the asker want were I currently live. They don’t want the answer of where I have started my own journey separate from my parents and my childhood friends. They assume that I hold no ties to this place, to this life. I know it is a stepping stone to the next “great adventure”, but I have created a new family of friends here.
I don’t want to go back “home” and try to be the person I once was. Nothing is the same back “home”. My childhood friends have moved on with their lives. My parents have redecorated my room. All of my secret place I loved to hang out are either destroyed or taken over by the next generation. I don’t want to move back in time or place as I am asked to every time someone who asks “where is home?” and expecting my answer to be a past place wants. I want to live here, make mistakes here and call here home.
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I feel sad when my friends find new homes away from their hometown because it means that we are no longer together. Sure I might talk to my friends online or rarely by mail but I am also smart enough to realize that I am slowly drifting out of their lives. Some day I will just be a distant memory, a small thought in their minds, "Hmm I wonder what brittany is up to these days." Those moments will come less and less over the years as I fail to interact with them.
ReplyDeleteSo when people I love call a new place home I get grumpy. I get upset, because I know that they will never be coming back into my life and that is scary. I don't want to admit there will be no more of those moments together. I don't want to admit that when I see my friends after large chunks of time have passed that I feel like an outsider. So instead I just withdraw into myself and cry and act grumpy towards those who try to reach me. Maybe your friends have similar reasons for disliking your choice to choose your own home.
I am sorry if we make you feel left out, it is just that we all have to continue to grow. I miss you so much everyday. A lot of the times I think I should text britters and then I remember that you don't have text messages. Just so you know, those moments of what is brittany up to these days happens more often then you would think but I have to push them out of my head or else I get grumpy. <3 you!
ReplyDeleteIt isn't your fault Betty. I know you have to grow and become your own person. It is just, this damn disease makes me feel like while all my friends are growing up I am getting more and more juvenile. The only people I make memories with these days are my grandparents and half the time the 3 of us are in varying states of pain and grumping at each other.
ReplyDeleteI would be lying if I said it wasn't a stab in my heart when I see my friends graduating, getting jobs, getting married, having kids, going places, having parties. I know they have every right to be happy and I do want them to be, but part of me is really bitter that I will never be part of that life. I am just not capable of being that person and I am beginging to think that there will never be a single day left in my life where I am not in so much pain I want to die, where I am not so exhausted that cooking dinner leaves me ready for a nice long nap.
So it hurts and I get grumpy and I take it out on people who care about me because as much as they love me things are never even going to be close to how they used to be.
I love you and miss you tons.