Notions of Home

A few of you know that I grew up "an army brat". We moved every 2-4 years my entire childhood. Most of this was great and I adjusted well. We did have one move that wasn't great, but I survived that too. For the most part, "home" was where Mom & Dad were and where our stuff was...or most of our stuff, since there were a few postings that the bulk of our things ended up in storage.

In my early twenties, I had things at my parents' home, things in storage, and things with me. I finally managed to get my spread-out-self into one location and I moved in with Ray. That's when the crisis hit! It did not help that my parents moved to a new place and I had never lived there. When I went to visit, it was not "going home". This lasted through several moves and finally they have settled in their own place and I feel okay going there. It is not my home, but I like it and I enjoy going to visit.

Ray and I have also lived in a few places together. First it was a rented condo and we shared with another woman. She was a pig and very hard to live with. After a year she moved out and things settled. It was not exactly my home, but I liked living there. Eventually we moved to another city and lived in an apartment there. Let me just say that in no way shape or form would that be considered home for anyone. It was not a great place. I was never at home there. Our stuff lived there, but we escaped to visit friends and family almost every weekend.

Then we started looking for a house. We decided on another city, because we didn't like the last one, and ended up here. The housing market was booming and it took 3 bids before we got a house. We moved. We had a house and a yard. I have trees!

Ray and I settled in, started to make friends, and slowly grew into this place. We had a baby. More life and more settling. As our firstborn grew and began to make friends, we made more friends too. We had another baby and I realized how many friends we had!

This morning, I was showering before getting my babies up and ready for the day and thinking about the days when I was having a crisis. What was home? Where was home? Would I ever have one or was it something for other people? I have never once regretted my childhood, but I desperately wanted someplace that was home in the deepest sense of the word. And this morning it dawned on me that 5 1/2 years later, a home birth, a community, the ability to come into the neighbourhood and have my whole self sigh with the relief of coming to my place...well, I am HOME.