8/4/25

For as long as my memories trace back, home was where the heart was - though I didn't always know it. Home was the warm embrace of a parent, surrounded by the accompanying luggage required for bi-weekly visitation; it was home cooked meals served with sparkling cider so that my sister and I felt just as fancy as my father and his pinot grigio; it was a favorite toy or pair of pants that would allow the immediate sensation of comfort, despite finding myself in a house or room that did no such thing. Home was where I could let my guard down and feel as though the outside world was finally an afterthought. Home was not the walls I found myself surrounded by, but the environment and relationships I built for - and largely by - myself. 

Five years ago, much of the stress occurring in my life was the struggle to come to grips with this realization. I saw what home was for others - how my friends got to go home on the weekends and knew they had everything they ever possessed waiting for them. I hated the fact that my "home" was never something I got to experience indefinitely, but rather a temporary residence that simply held me and my possessions until it was once again time to pack up and relocate. And for years, my main goal was to do whatever I could to change my perspective on this. I bought new sheets so that my head felt like it was falling on the same pillows every night. I spread out the essentials, keeping halves of the same skin care routine, body wash, and clothing at each house so that I didn't feel like I was moving so much as I was simply spending a few days at my "other house". I painted my walls a color that seemed only I could fully appreciate, hung fairy lights in between the boards of the top bunk, forming a kind of hidey-hole in a room that yielded very little space of my own. I craved to live the idea that my home was simply the place in which I lived, a physical location in which I felt the most comfort, the most gratitude, and the most safety. And after years of rearranged furniture and monthly-changed colors of beddings, the only resolution I could come to was that my home simply could not be found. 

I moved away and built a new one. I built the space I never could have before, one surrounded by everything I loved, decorated, made, and paid for by me. I bought picture frames and printed photos, I made bed skirts out of the sheets I once slept on. But most importantly, I created a new sense of family. In college, I found myself completely alone for the very first time, and in a very exciting way. Each person I met was an opportunity; a future best friend, a future roommate, a new experience. And that is exactly what happened. Every person I met played some kind of role in creating who I am now, giving me new perspectives and new chances at the life I craved. By the time I graduated, I had spent every waking moment with those I grew to love in a way that words cannot do it justice. I made coffee with them in the morning and dinner with them at night. They saw me cry, they saw me happy, they saw me in those weird hours between 11 and 12:00 PM when the lack of sleep mixes with a burst of energy and creates a sense of humor unlike anything else. 

Sitting on a plane, flying thousands of miles away, it only just hit me how much it all truly meant. It wasn't the fact that I bought special frames to hang special pictures on my special walls that made my life so special. It wasn't Songbird Cafe or the studio, or the nights spent awake far beyond my very reasonable bedtime, drinking and talking with my friends; it was the fact that I got to live through all of it with them. I got to share, not just my life, but the fruits of everything my life had been, then and before, with them, building a bond that truly cannot be compared to. This is the home that I am now leaving. A home formed by gossiping on the balcony, and quick trips to the market in between episodes of whatever show we were currently watching. A home made by the stupendous amounts of sheer joy and love that I had for them, and got to experience with them. The home I am leaving is the memories I have there, and not the fact that I even enjoyed Arizona at all. 

In large parts, I am very excited to be back home, given my newfound definition. I am excited to spend time with those who have occupied my mind in their distance from me, and be able to enjoy the senses I learned to appreciate with them for the foreseeable future. In a way, I am not returning to the same home I once longed to escape from. The debate has been ongoing, whether or not one can truly ever "go home" after leaving it. My answer is that you can't. The streets may be the same, but the cafe you once loved has been replaced by a bank, not one mile away from the next one. Your house may look the same, but the cups are kept in a different cupboard than they used to be. But these minute changes are not the defining factor of what makes a return to the place you grew up feel so melancholic - it is the change that you have gone through in its absence. 

When I lived in this same house four years ago, I existed as an entirely different person. I knew love with limits; love with phone numbers and duffle bags packed with the necessities. I felt perfectly fine waking up at 10 am and starting my day with a quick wash of the dishes and a prolonged scroll on TikTok. I lived with my family, yet I hardly saw them, each of us working separate 40-hour weeks and none of us having much energy to do anything else. I doomscrolled on Grindr, and had yet to kiss, let alone love another person, in the romantic sense, of course. My hair was different, my piercings were different, my style was different. I listened to different artists and consumed different media. I had never experienced life alone, but surrounded by people. Now that I've come back, everything feels just as different. It isn't that much has actually changed; in fact, it surprises me how much everything is almost exactly how it was when I had left for the first time. Rather, the context of where I live within my life simply could not be more different. 

I have a new appreciation for the color green. Walking around the neighborhood has me gazing at the leaves and admiring the buzz of cicadas in a way that a teenage version of myself never would have. I find myself glad that the days last so long, and I stare at the sunset now knowing what it looks like from another place. What's more, I don't long for connection quite like I once did. Surrounded by a county populated by people who have very little, if anything at all, in common with me, I used to crave so deeply the kind of relationships I knew everyone else had. But now I find myself feeling quite content with those I know to be in my life, hopefully for the rest of it. I have my friends who gave me a sense of home simply by knowing they were close by if I needed them. I have my roommates and loved ones who I got to experience some of the most intimate moments a person can. I have my family who, no longer necessarily needing to provide for me, can appreciate each other in a way that only time can allow.

I moved home and left another. For the longest time, my emotions have not been able to remain consistent on this matter. I know I was meant for either place, and I know I was ready to move on to the next both times I moved. But as I write, each word finds a new place in my mind, and I'm beginning to realize that, despite the sadness that always coincides with a departure from a time in your life that you're not quite ready to end, there is also a lot of joy that Im realizing I had yet to give the proper amount of time to appreciate. I had been so focused on the show, and then graduation, and then whatever the Summer amounted to, that the realization of what life was about to become was only hitting me in superficial ways. Given my sendoff and well-earned tears, I find myself focusing more on the positive sides of life. Just like returning here is not the same as it was when I had no other options, departure in a year will feel just as bittersweet as my departure from Arizona. I will once again mourn the loss of family dinners, binged TV shows, and morning gossip with a side of coffee - only this time, I know what I am signing up for. I know what adulthood looks like, and I know who will be there waiting for me once it starts again. I've found my people, and though the places in which we live have changed - constantly - the sense of home that I've gained when seeing them is not going anywhere.