Error 404: Home Not Found
I’ve been out looking, with a flashlight
I hope to find someday my place, my home. It won’t be in faces, it won’t be in houses, it won’t be in cities. Even though that’s where I seek it.
I wonder what it looks like then — a cabin in the woods with 20 cats, as I spend my days reading and tending to my plants?
A condo in the city with friends, where we all have fast-paced lives balancing work with social activities?
A suburban picket-fenced house with a partner and two children, spending my days in domestic revelry?
Having sought the idea of “home” in several places now, I realize that I’m more attached to the idea of it, rather than anything I’ve hoped to find it in. I dream of peace, joy, laughter, and most of all, the knowledge that I belong, and the comfort that comes with it.
I have been told, time and again, that I’ll find it “within me”. I’ve been told that it’s been there all along.
So I try, I try hard. I hold myself close, teach myself self-sufficiency and trust, and celebrate my existence every day. Yet I don’t feel it. Home always feels so far away, like a vague figure in the dark that I’m not sure is real.
Are my efforts futile? Am I supposed to let it be, and instead let home find me?
Maybe it’s coming my way, or it still needs me to seek it. Maybe I’ve found it already and it was only meant to be mine for a short while. Maybe it’s tomorrow, maybe it’s years away. Maybe it’s never.
So I’ll rest my head here tonight. But I’ll dream of the day when my pillow feels right and my bed has no wrong side. And I’ll stay searching.
Is this searching my home?
