Where I Call Home

When I spent nearly a week homeless on the streets of Surrey, British Columbia, I experienced first-hand the concept of not having a home of my own. For most of my life, home was where I was sheltered and protected; a shield to the outside, dangerous world. But at the age of twenty-nine, I left my childhood home and set out on my own, unsure of what to expect from being outside my bubble. For the first time, my home was no longer the house I lived in, but it became something flexible, carried around here and there like a turtle carrying its shell. I cleaned my clothes at a laundry mat, showered in a recreation centre and stayed at fast food restaurants that opened all night. Home became a patchwork of locations where I spent my day, as well as my vehicle where I slept. Not lasting even a week, I was admitted to hospital, which was essentially yet another temporary home for me. But what I really learned is that my definition of home could change, for better or for worse, and it is that understanding that motivates me to seek the best home I can.

What I found common among all the various homes I experienced throughout the latter half of my life is that it is a function based on many other variables other than location or place. I believe that the definition of home can be described in the simple acronym HOME; heart, origin, mind and eternity.

First off, home can be simply where or what a person deeply cares about. If they really treasure tulips, pansies and marigolds, a flower garden may feel like home to them. Or it may be a person that they are really attached to, hence, they feel at home when that specific person is around. Speaking from experience, as long as my mom was around, I would feel more at home. Not having her beside me instantly made me feel alone and scared; feeling like I was outside my comfort zone. When someone has attachments, they take up room in a person’s heart, and when they are around those attachments, it makes them feel like they belong. The things in a person’s heart are basically what they treasure the most, the things or people they highly value. That is why parents who are empty nesters go through a crisis of adjusting when their children leave, causing their definition of home to be altered.

If you add to the heartful desires of a person a second aspect, the concept of home becomes even clearer. The origin of a person gives a more literal definition of home, but with a weaker connotation. A person’s homeland or ancestral land are also measures to describes a person’s ethnic home, dictating their race and sometimes their speech, dress or culture. But this definition can be changed by the concept of immigration, where people move to other places to build a new home for themselves and their families. Nevertheless, people still identify their ethnicity as from a particular place even if they become citizens of where they immigrated. The concept of origin as part of a home plays on the tendency for people who are alike to group together. Familiarity helps people feel at home, where they feel more comfortable and accepted. That is why, for example, in ethnic regions in Metro Vancouver, people try to bring their homeland to the city, using Chinese or Punjabi signs, making their customers feel more akin to their businesses.

A stronger definition of home is determined by the mind, where the concept of home is interpreted and understood based on what the person thinks should constitutes a place to belong. A kid in Africa may think of a small hut with a bed as his home, but an urban school boy in Europe may feel more at home in a luxurious bungalow with his family. What the mind feels is comfortable may explain the differences in opinion. One kid may think a straw bed is comfortable enough, while another may prefer a proper mattress and pillow. Therefore, what constitutes a home is easily altered by what the person understands home to be, and adaptation is required to change one’s definition of being at home. But there is one more aspect that explains how the mind accustoms its definition of a home, and that is the aspect of time.

Lastly home can be where the person spends the most time, from several minutes to an eternity. An unborn child’s home would be in the womb, whereas a sailor on duty in the navy may think his vessel is like a home to him. Time makes people feel attached to a place, object or person, allowing for more interactions. The more interactions there are, the stronger the bond as it grows on the person. Hence, the longer the time spent with an object, person or thing, the more at home a person feels around them.

Therefore, home can be described as where your heart, origin, mind and eternity will be, a changing, dynamic concept that supersedes simply a location or place.