Being home after being away for a while, or in this case, a long time always makes me think a lot about what a home means to me and how it differs from place to place.
There is that saying, "Home is where the heart is". Home is where you make it and as long as you are happy in your heart, no matter where you are you can call home. It may also depend on who you are with. You may not particularly love the location of where you are loving but you love a person or the people you are surrounded by.
Up until my last trip home this is what I totally thought. Home was where the heart is. Home is where you make it. To an extent this is true however there is a line that "Home is where the heart is" cannot cross. I have lived Winnipeg. So cold in the winter that you never want to go outside, but beautiful and full of life in the spring and summer. I have lived in Cairo. Dirty and crazy busy, with millions of people, including men that can not keep their mouths closed or their eyes off you as you walk past. It is also full of history, with all the amenities and extracurricular activities anyone could ask for. Cairo has its own kind of lifestyle to offer. I am now currently living in Juba. Juba has a life of its own. With a few less than adequately clean pools and restaurants being the only place to hang out besides ones own or a friends accommodation, Juba does not have much to offer a person. Oh and there is a small mountain you can climb which is actually a very enjoyable activity. Even though it is lacking excitement and tourist attractions there is a strange beauty about Juba that you do not see until you have been here. In part it is the people, and the other part is...well I am not sure what that is...when I am away from Juba I eventually find myself missing being there. Juba is a mediocre place to live compared to the beautiful places on the coast in Africa that are just a flight away, but Juba has found a place in my heart even without any fancy, lovely, exciting things to lure me in.
However, I think the only place I will ever feel truly at home is in the tree covered land, rolling hills covered in wheat, barley, canola and beautiful skies of Alberta. Alberta is my home and will always be my home. I have lived in quite a few places, and yes I have fallen in love with those places. The love I have for these places is so different from what I feel about Alberta. It is the memories a place evokes. Alberta reminds me of the first 18 years of my life. Time spent with family. It is home. Driving down the country roads that I used to drive down every day, seeing the familiar places brings a peace that no other place has given me.
Maybe the day will come that I will be able to call another place my home and it will feel like my Alberta home.
Only time will tell.
~Where we love is home - home that our feet may leave, but not our hearts. - Olive Wendall Holmes~
You can definitely make your place of abode any place in the world and find adventure and good in that place but home, the place you know the best, does not leave you. After 32 years in Canada, ID is still home to your father! He is home here but his "home" will always be there I think. Love the Holmes quote.
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