Being home. Never felt at home in my original house, never safe, never at ease. In my first apartment, I was home, but achingly lonely. Having a roommate in college apartments was always unsettling. The bad marriage felt more like a home I didn't know how to define - at first. It became worse than any lack of home, it became an anti-home, dangerous, hostile.
I was teased in Basic for referring to the barracks as "home." But, that was where my stuff was, even though it was mostly not my chosen stuff - all green and issued. But a good wool blanket, a toilet and shower - close enough to being home. I had very low standards. A safe place to sleep, warmth.
Once I met D, I began to know what home could mean. Peace at home. The whole time we were away*, I found acceptance and safety in his arms, needing no other home. Together, we would live in numerous apartments, and although I felt displaced, I never felt homeless.
I remember when we got off the train in Boston, and could not find my cousins who had promised to pick us up. I broke down and wept in exasperated exhaustion for a minute, pulled myself together, and we talked about what else we could do. (Turned out, we'd just picked a bad door, and found Elizabeth and Ed a few minutes later.) Desperate, yes, alone, no. I'd brought home with me, and there we were.
I can see that it would be more difficult to find home in one's own skin alone, but I can also see a way. Where one is one's own home, and others visit, come and go. And the home inside myself has grown as well as the one I share with D. I always prefer him near, but I think my home is myself, and he is part of it, but not all of it. We are a home together, we are each of us capable of being a home unto ourselves. With a cat, of course.
The geology class is excellent. I am finally really understanding the science. I think I finally get the idea of metamorphic rock. Not metamorphorical rock (like Pratchett Trolls.) It's wonderful to be taught by someone knowledgeable and passionate. Learning about a foot wall vs a hanging wall, gneiss and schist.
*Activated to army service for Gulf War I.
6 comments:
I had no trouble calling the home I grew up in 'home'. I lived there from age 6 months until I was 24 years old at which point I moved into an apartment with what then was my girlfriend and who is now my wife. We lived in that apartment for four years, and all the while it was my 'home'. We then moved to an outer subarb for seven years. That house became my 'home'. Now I live in a house much closer to my job, and this is definitely my 'home'. We plan on being here until the kids are grown up and out, so we'll be here for likely at least two decades.
As for finding home in one's self, this is a matter of interstitial self confidence. I have moments where I am flush with the stuff, and other moments where I haven't hardly any, so internal 'home' can be fleeting.
I am not taking a geology class presently.
Metaphorical rock sounds intruiging!!
gz,
Metamorphorical rock. Metamorphic and Metaphorical mashed together, a la Pratchett.
Where I grew up, I haven't called "home" for a long time, though for part of me it always will be. Where I am now is the nearest to being home than anywhere else I've lived in the interim.
Conversely, when I've travelled to other countries, I feel as though there is a little of whatever consitutes "home" for me, and which touches me while I'm there.
Home is where your stuff is.
Pacian,
So says George Carlin.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MvgN5gCuLac
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