The first home I remember living in is an apartment in Tianjin, China. I remember a big bed, a gigantic model ship, and little else.

The second home I lived in is an apartment in New Westminster, Canada. I got there at the age of six and started school with extra English classes, the result being that I more or less forgot everything about Chinese. Anyway, the apartment was a small one, like the one in Tianjin. The outside was wood (or brick?), giving a more homely feel compared to Tianjin concrete, and the neighbourhood on Ash street had a lot of trees. The school was within walking distance.

There was a small television in the bedroom, and on a certain night, I had the misfortune to flick to a horror channel. Being little older than six, this was not a pleasant experience for me, and it was perhaps after that that I gained a strong aversion to a clump of fabric on the bedroom curtain. It looked like a face—a grinning face, no less.

*Not the same curtain.

My feud with the grinning face continued for years, but despite that, the small apartment in New Westminster was a good place to live.

My parents started looking for a new home when I was in grade four. We went to a few places and eventually settled on one of two, over which I had the executive decision. The first place was a small apartment, just like the one we were already living in, but had an active and welcoming community full of weekly events and stuff like that. The second place had three floors.

I chose the three floors.

We took a vacation back at Tianjin; it was fun. Nice relatives, good food, places to tour. Air was horrible and it was like a furnace in what should’ve been winter, but whatever. We went back to my first home, which was still our home, and we went up the creaky steps that carried the distinct flavour of dust and mystery. The place hadn’t changed much. The bed was still there. The ship was still there. The toilet didn’t work, but whatever. It was a place I didn’t remember much, but it had definitely been my home.

Here is a conversation that never happened:

“Hi Kevin.”

“Hi. How do you know my name?”

“Not important. I have a question: What does Home mean to you?”

“You mean where I live?”

“Maybe. But I don’t mean home—I mean Home.”

“Huh?”

Anyway, the vacation ended and I was eager to see my school friends again; in fact, on the same day that we came back form the airport, I had us drive by the school and asked if I could go in to say hi. My parents said no, as that was no longer my school.

The third home I lived in is a co-op unit in Burnaby. It was sizable compared to the apartment but not really that big, and the basement got flooded a few months later. Still, it had a backyard, which was nice, and I had my own room, which was nicer. I settled in comfortably enough and forgot about the grinning curtain clump. Years later, I could no longer imagine living in a cramped apartment where I had to share a room and didn’t have stairs. Still, it had definitely been my home.

Almost a decade later, my parents started looking for another home. We were going to get someplace really big this time, but I found myself resisting the idea, wanting to just stay where we were. Why? I wasn’t sure. A large part of it was convenience, a desire to not go through all that trouble associated with moving yet again, but another part was perhaps that I just didn’t want to leave. This home was comfortable, just like the last home had been and, I believe, the home before that, and I just didn’t want to go. But I did. We went through that trouble and believed it was worth it.

The fourth home that I am living in is one side of a duplex in Coquitlam. It’s big, too big really, and we’ll own it all once the mortgage is paid. The inconveniences are many, the biggest for me being the 3-zone commute to UBC, but I can now no longer imagine living where I had lived before. Still, that place had definitely been my home, just as this place is and just as the next place I go to will probably be.

“Hi Kevin.”

“Hello.”

“What does Home mean to you?”

“You mean where I live?”

“Maybe. But I don’t mean home—I mean Home.”

“Easy. It’s where I live.”

Works Cited

“About Us.” Garden Square Housing Co-Op. GSHC, 2015. Web. 5 June 2015. 

“Bedroom Curtains Pictures.” Soulfjord.com. Soulfjord.com, 2015. Web. 5 June 2015.