Taking Home Wherever I Go

I recently read a book by Molly Wizenberg called A Homemade Life. Aside from writing phenomenally about her life and the food that is part of it, Molly talks about not being sure if she’s found home, but having taken comfort in having Paris as her second home. For Molly, it’s France. For me, it’s Mexico: its food, scenery, culture and people. What is more important to me, however, is finding a way to incorporate home into my life wherever I am; to be able to make any place on earth my home, regardless of how humble or impermanent it may be. It’s a survival tactic: I can’t continue the pattern I’ve had for so long of leaving my life completely and coming back to nothing and starting over. I need to be able to sense some continuity in my life and plans, and at this point I need to find a way to do so that does not include buying that piece of comfort.

So, you ask, what is that home for me?

Home is someplace safe, where the pressure falls off and there is nothing left to keep you from sleeping deeply and peacefully. Home is a dream I had once, where I closed the door behind me and I was surrounded by nothing but what brought me joy and no pain. It is the place where my mind finally rests.
Home is a tangible place, but not always the same place. It is the answer to where I want to be and what I am inside, in the part of me I can’t always tap into, that knows who I am without any of the doubts and pressures that I otherwise cannot fully dismiss.
Home is a person. Home is the people who smile at my joys and remind me where I am going, and that I will make it there.
Home is somewhere that I have worked toward and made it to. It is the way that I fall into bed, exhausted, after a long day doing exactly what I want.
What is home to me? Home is where I eat the fruits of my own labors and cry over my disappointments without fear that they will seek to haunt me; home is where the stars shine just for me and the air is always crystal clear.
Home is where I always have wanted to find. It is somewhere that I dream of, without knowing what exactly I am looking for. When I say I am homeless, I do not mean it in the sense of walls and a roof; rather I consider it a state of mind I have been trying to reach that is still outside my grasp. It is the last place I want my head to lie; I want to wake up bed at home and be able to simply lie there without wondering what it is I am searching for or how to find it.
My home has windows that show a vast ocean of possibility outside, a skylight that shows the stars of opportunity shining brightly, and the shelter I need to remind myself that I will be okay.
I am nothing without home, but home is still an unfound refuge. It is nothing without my dreams, my hopes, my aspirations, but its structure is solid even without them. My home is without need of shoring, for it has been there all along.
Home is something I ache to find, yet will never be able to survive without; I already have it.

Home is a place I've been looking for for quite awhile, but I tend to find it only fleetingly. Although I imagine it as a tangible place -- and I even have a picture of what it looks like in my head -- when I really think about it I don't think it's a place at all, more a mental refuge that I need to find and not lose track of again. I feel closest to home at the moment that I strike out on a new adventure, when my path has yet to be carved out and my thoughts are on nothing more than the day ahead of me and how I will spend it. In my home, I have been able to accept who I am without wondering what other people think of my path, have been able to let go of some of the worries that do me no good and waste brain space and power, and this place is one in which everything I do is an accomplishment, but doesn't have to mean anything at all.
If this home were a place, however, it would have a river running through it, and no rules against bathing nude in the sunshine, or the moonlight.

Love and homey kisses
Morgan