Home. How to describe it…?

It’s certainly the building. But not just the structure because that’s the house. Let’s think of it as a container. Yes. It is a container of people and objects and memories. But there are lots of these containers, more specifically the home is a container of what is comfortable.

Home to me is a literal and figurative space. Literally, I live there, (sometimes) sleep. Figuratively, I am at rest there. It’s not a home if I cannot fall asleep, and not only sleep but feel rested. I hadn’t considered the feeling of home and how the word is bound to notions of dwelling-space and emotional space until I moved. When the topic of moving arises, most people consider the literal complications, such as the time it takes to pack and how big a truck you need.

Moving. A tricky problem to confront when considering the house/home. For me, I literally moved around the corner. Same neighborhood, same friends, same family contained in the dwelling. But for some reason I couldn’t attain a restful sleep. For weeks I would lay in the same bed with the same furnishings around me (though arranged differently) unable to grapple with the fact that it is the space I was supposed to occupy. When I was awake I thought the new house was great. Twice as big as the old one, and newer. A real-life real estate reality show come true. But I would still drive to the old house (it hauntingly hadn’t sold, and wouldn’t for 8 months) and walk around the now empty space. Sometimes I would cry. It was so bizarre and irrational because I had gotten what I had wanted out of my family’s new house and literally nothing had changed except the space. I still feel compelled to drive past that old house periodically. We moved out 4 years ago.

The first stab I made at separating from my family was last year. I had been prolonging the first college move-out for three years waiting for someone I could move with. I was terrified then of the prospect of a craigslist roommate or living alone, and I remain thus today. I chose a close friend and everyone said we would hate each other after a month. We didn’t (small sense of victory there) and I was relieved with my choice to surround myself with a person I felt comfortable enough to share my space with. I was even a little glad to be rid of the shackles of sheltered, parented life. But the home was the problem. When I visited my family’s house, I would stay all day, and drag it out until the next day… or two. But why! I had my own house with my best friend and no rules about dinner. I realized that I had finally settled myself into that awkward moved-into house I spoke about and that now instead of visiting my old house, I would visit my hauntingly vacant old bedroom. Over time, I eventually settled myself into the roommate house.

When I moved back into my family home (yup, that eventually was a failed experiment) I had to repeat my house/home anxiety. So, I must deduce that for me, the concept of the house as dwelling and home as emotional safety are inextricably intertwined. I dread moving. Not because of the physical boxing of objects (I perversely enjoy the organizing/reorganizing) but because of the unavoidable and exhausting nostalgia that is sure to overwhelm.

Home to me is the physical place and the mental space of comfort. It is as much a construct for feelings of joy, rest, belonging, safety, and nostalgia as it is for feelings of sadness, uneasiness, alienation, fear, and eeriness. I know that I will have to move my home throughout life and that I will eventually settle in each time. I also know now that I am only able to appreciate the positive values in connection to a physical place because of the negative counterparts each place can also represent.

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