Where is the place you call home?

In this morning’s paper I read a story about a young couple from New Orleans who came to the Hudson Valley when they were formed from their home by Katrina. Their daughter was born here, but after only a few months, the family returned to New Orleans because that felt like home—even in a small FEMA trailer.

I know people who have lived their lives within a few miles of their birthplace. Some have never traveled out of their state, and some barely out of their county. For me, that is a foreign thought. I would never have met people and have friends from around the country and around the world.

When I was in my early twenties, my parents said they were talking about moving from the farm. That thought horrified me. It was “home.” Once I married, Mom and Dad felt no restraint and within a year they left the farm for a small, nearby village and a totally different life. They lived there many more years than on the farm where they’d moved only months before I was born. I really “left home” when I went to college and only returned for vacations and visits.

This morning I asked my son and my daughter, “Of the several places you have lived, where is home?” Their response, “Where I am.”

So where is home for me? Where I am. My husband and I had twelve different addresses. Each one of them was “home” because that’s where we were. Each time we moved, we met new people, made new friends, and formed new ideas about the world we live in.

The question remains, “Where is your home?”

Our Home in Ahuas, Honduras