I think it's about time one of us posts something, and it looks like I'm up. I've been thinking a lot lately about home and how complex that concept is. Home can be people or a specific house or a town or a country or any number of things, really. The thing that really gets me about home, though, is how it defines who you are and what you become.
I have a friend (some of you have now met her) who grew up in Botswana, Africa. If you ask her where she's from she'll say she lives in Abilene. If you ask her where home is she'd probably tell you she lives in Abilene. In both cases, though, I think she just wants to say home is a little village in Botswana. Marcella has told me that she'll probably never get to go back home, and even if she did it wouldn't be like home anymore. Things have changed, to be sure.
I have another friend who grew up in Slovenia. I've talked with her about how she's never really been sure where her hometown is. Even now that she lives in Abilene her parents are in another country serving as missionaries, and her siblings are living in various other places. She's not even at home with her family at this point. And little ol' me grew up in a town so small and lacking in diversity that a laugh generally accompanies the demographics. The farthest I've ever moved in my life, before college, has involved no more than hauling my belongings upstairs or across the hall. I live on a family farm, for goodness sakes. I live across the road from where my dad grew up and in the same county as my mother has always lived. I like it. A lot.
There are obviously different benefits and downfalls of every place, as far as growing up is concerned. I don't have any authority as far as moving goes. I can't, from personal experience, say if it's good or bad or nothing. I do know, though, that I'm really thankful for where and how I was raised. Being able to bring someone into my town that has never been there before was really kind of amazing. I got to see things through the filter of her experience. It was nice. The really interesting thing, though, is how I have a connection to my hometown and the people who also call it home. The same is true for Marcella and Michelle. None of us would be who we are today without our home, whatever shape that home has taken.
It doesn't just stop there. ha. I've moved now, even though my home hasn't changed, and it's good because I'm now being shaped by another environment. Here in Abilene I'm shaped by my group of friends, the people on my hall and the people in my church. I think it's a real blessing (does that word seem hokey to anyone else?) that community forms and shapes people like it does. It's a really good thing, I think. Community in the truest sense of the word is exactly what we're meant for, I think. Even though it takes some critiquing to be sure we're not being influenced by something wrong, I think it's nice how we're continually being shaped by our community.
I also like that blogging doesn't have to always connect... stream of consciousness. That's where it's at.
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"Home is where your cell phone no longer says 'Roam'."
*clap, clap clap clap*
This is just the post I needed, for I have been thinking about "home" a lot lately. Not just my home, but what "home" means. I find it fascinating how even just a scent, or a food, or an object can remind someone of home. As I'm sitting here in this warm computer lab, I try to sum up what "home" really is, than I began to think about traits that define home - safety, love, comfort, security, being wanted, consistency, an open door, joy...than I realized that some people don't have that, and it made me sad. Not that they don't have a home in the physical sense, but in the figurative sense. Their homes may be broken or unsafe, a place where they are not nurtured and loved. In my aiding experience here in Monmouth, I am seeing children who come from this sort of place. My heart goes out to them. I realize how grateful and blessed I am to come from a home that possess wonderful, growing characteristics. Laura, I love how you used the word community to help describe home. When driving home from Monmouth, I get excited simply seeing the Pike County sign, then the Pittsfield sign, Jiffi Stop, my church, the high school, the courthouse, my street, and then my actual physical home, my house. I think that community is such a part of what builds us. The people we know, the people we meet, the people to whom we're related, have all had an impact, whether we realize it or not, on making us who we are today, the person I am sitting at this computer right now with my grummbling stomach. I wish to thank all of you for being a part of my "home." Know that you are always welcome...
*On a side note - stream of consciousness...woot for "Death of Salesman" We're reading that in Modern Theatre class and I couldn't help but laugh this morning and think of Mr. Ring
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