Quilted Homes

Home - a word invoking warmth and fuzziness. Is home a place, a person or a state of mind I wonder? Or is it all that makes you feel safe and welcome? Being home is being who you truly are -no pretenses, no judgments, no explanations, just being . Home, an assortment of pieces of memories - of places and people that fill your days with warmth and laughter. I have been collecting those pieces over the years and take it with me every time we move.

Yet the feeling of truly belonging - of feeling that there is nothing better than being  right here continues to elude me to a certain extent. I have left friends behind - carried the memories, but part of me is still in the houses I called homes. Moving does that to you. You  are constantly searching for that safe haven  called home. The familiarity, the confidence that you actually know the place and its quirky character. I guess it is not moving, it is just feeling of unrest, the search for that place or moment where you are just you.

Home is when a place is no longer mysterious, no longer alluring, but still it is what you know best. It knows you and you know it. Home is just being so familiar with someone or some place that it  is a part of you - a part that never ever leaves you.

For me home is familiarity and acceptance. I know the walls of my house, I know the creases on my husbands face, I know the twinkle in my child's eyes and I know that in many ways I am home to them. Yet a part of me still yearns for walls where my son scribbled his first A,the streets where I spent time dreaming,  for for all the places and people I called home at different stages of my life.

This place I call home now, chose me. I belong here for now..... The memories of the places I called home are receding deeper, and at times I hear the call loud and clear, only to hush it down. The mountains have captivated me and every time I struggle to define my home, try to go back, I hear a whisper, this is home, this is where you belong.