Home

Emily Dickinson once said "where thou art, that is home."

Right now, I am in a place that is over 1,000 miles away from where I called home for 25 years. Where I am today is a place I feel is now familiar, but would I have ever guessed halfway across the country as true home? Will this feel that way everywhere I go?

South felt the same way. Like a stop. Home is a place called Harleysville, a place with so many Italian restaurants, you'd feel like you'd eventually get sick of it, but you simply never do. It's a crutch. That's just the way it is. My family and friends are there. 95% of the people I've ever known are there.

I've wondered when the new will feel like home. Not that I expect the stay here to be ephemeral, nor do I assume it to be fruitless, as I have forged some relationships, but none quite like home. It might come down to my own introversion, my own identity, forged back home. This Pennsylvanian feels like a foreign exchange student.

The customs of a fast-paced, transitory east clash with the customs of a slower-paced, more permanent midwest. I'm stuck in my ways, getting in my own way almost daily. I'm not used to this. In a way, I can't identify. I'm the yellow dot in a blue painting. You can tell I'm not from around here.

I will miss out on so much. I've missed out on a full family reunion. I've missed out on my old roommate's wedding. I've missed out on my favorite sports team's unlikely playoff run. I've missed out on cherished memories with my two Shelties back home. The reality is I won't have much time with them anymore. It breaks my heart.

That is home. That is the home I was so used to being in. The place with family, friends, and a cultural identity that I associate with. And right now, it's ripped from me in pursuit of a dream. Home continues on. Life without me isn't much different, I guess. Cogs still turn. Suns still rise. Socially, I am but a thought, but not a reality.

I will never live in Harleysville again unless I give up on the dream I have set out to chase. I don't think, on the surface, people understand the gravity of this sacrifice. I am as scared as I was months ago, to my core, about what all of this means. A chance for me to live, but a certainty that I won't be home. I'm no social creature, but I at least know that there is comfort to my identity back there.

I will see what tomorrow brings...because at this point, there's no other direction to go than forward. Home will be there as long as I live on this earth, of which I feel so blessed to live in the first place. I just want here to feel more like home, more and more. But maybe it always will be so ephemeral.

No one ever said the 20s were easy. I'm seeing exactly why that is.