Homeless but at Home

I'm so blessed to be sitting in my comfy couch with a brownie and cold glass of milk. Sometimes you just have to sit down, be quiet, look around and realize how blessed you are. Add a brownie and it's a perfect moment! Ahh, home sweet home. But I haven't felt like this all the time recently. The meaning of "home" has been begging to be defined in my heart for a while.

We have recently been traveling and visiting friends and family in various places. Since we have only been in our current city a little over six months, being surrounded by familiar faces and places during our travels brought me to a sudden state of loneliness. Actually, it was a feeling of homelessness. I struggled to understand myself as I longed to return to the house where my bed was and my baby's awaiting crib and clothes are, yet not wanting to leave the familiarity of family laughter and friends' smiles, while at the same time just wanting to be wherever my husband was, plus also missing my immediate family and childhood memories. (If that was a confusing sentence, it's because it was a confusing moment!) I really just wanted to be home, but I didn't know where that was! And no wonder...in just the past 5 years I have lived at six different addresses, including 4 different cities, 3 different states and 2 different countries! Need any moving or culture adjustment advice? Just ask me!

So as I worked through these thoughts and feelings, I realized that for some people "home" is where they were born and grew up, where their family has always lived and their friends have always been. It's the place where they know the changes in the seasons, the gossip, and the traditions like the back of their hand. It's where they hope to always be, or at least always go back to.

Not the case with me. When you move as much as I have and try to embrace the places you are as much as possible, "home" no longer can be a geographical place alone. Or at all. I realized that "home" to me is people--the people that make me feel at home in their hearts. They are the ones with whom I can fully be myself, fully laugh, fully cry, fully make mistakes and fully find grace and accountability. No matter where it may be, those people are home to me. And, obviously, home to me in the most specific and intimate way would be my husband and my son (and future children). Wherever they are, that's my home.

Wherever God may place us through the course of our lives, I am confident and grateful to always have a home that is defined by more than just an achiterctural structure! Transitions of any kind are never easy, so if you are going through one, I hope you can be encouraged by these thoughts and define (or re-define) your own "home" as you trust what God is doing in your life.