A House is Not a Home

I have a lot of conversations with myself, conversations in my head. I get every word just right, and sometimes I practice the facial expressions, too.

I’ve had parts of this conversation out loud before, but I’ve never gotten to the juicy secret at the end. I’m being more honest with my feelings now. I’m probably a little too honest with them now, actually. But anyway, I’m being more honest and I’ve been practicing this conversation and it goes something like this.

Person 1: Oh Dalya, are you going home for the weekend?

Me: No, I’m going to visit my parents at their house.

See, the conversation usually moves on from here. I’ll ask what Person 1 is doing for the weekend, or they’ll ask me about Pennsylvania. No one probes. The distinction between house and home does not seem to be a rampantly important one, except for within the confines of my thoughts.

Nevertheless, it is an important distinction. If I could continue that conversation, it would go something like this:

Person 1: Isn’t that home? Where is home for you?

Now all of the focus is on me. Other people are in the background, listening intently to gain insight from the words of a 22 year old drama queen. So I respond:

Me: My parents’ house has not been home for a long time. Home is somewhere that you belong and somewhere that you long for. I do not have a home in that sense. I don’t feel that I belong anywhere.

Can you imagine the looks of intellectual anguish and emotional processing on the faces of the crowd that has gathered?

There’s one thing wrong with this practice conversation in my mind. If probed, I wouldn’t know where to say I was comfortable. Pennsylvania is not home. Palestine is not home. My apartment is sort of home, although I feel no sense of belonging there and a lot of sense of wanting to lie around there.

I like to think that the city is mine, and that I don’t have to share it with the millions of others who really do call it home. But I don’t even know if the city is home. I don’t like not knowing things. (I’m a big fan of Google.)

This mystery lives for another day, I suppose.