This week brought so many amazing a-ha moments for me. So much fuel for me to keep pushing forward. And it all begged the question, “What is home?”
I was listening to the Coldplay station on Pandora and this song came on which, when I paid attention to the lyrics, made me reflect on the definition of home and what feels like home. There was a line “If you get lost, you can always be found. Just know you’re not alone. I’m gonna make this place your home.”
Do you ever crave a food, or a smell, or a place, or the arms of a specific person, or a voice? So many things when experienced can have the connotation of home. Familiarity.
I spoke at a local college with a group of students about Afghan women and the effects of war on their economic and social status. I attended a film screening of a new documentary about the resurgence of the Taliban. I had lunch with an old friend. I cooked one of my most favorite meals. All of these felt like home.
Speaking with the students, engaging, listening, felt like home because I was just so comfortable there. Maybe it’s because I’m a mother or maybe it’s because I love bringing another perspective to what is portrayed about Afghanistan and Afghan women in the mainstream media. It felt natural and grounding.
Attending the film screening felt like home because during the Q&A I shed my nerves and spoke words of truth, challenging the gentleman who was facilitating the Q&A. He had felt it necessary to belittle the war in Afghanistan and the subsequent loss of civilian lives. In that moment, my voice was my home.
Having lunch with an old friend felt like home because I had not seen this person for a while, when we had been so close at one time. To reconnect. To hug. To get that scent. To be right beside them was familiar. It was a place I had been before, a place that was safe and happy.
Cooking my favorite meal felt like home because it tasted like what my mum cooks. The flavor, aroma, the very sight of it invoked that feeling. Nostalgia. Transporting me through so many years of my life. A tangible taste.
“If you get lost, you can always be found” allowed me to reflect, and these are some of the places where I find home. Home doesn’t have to be a fixed physical place. The definition can be so intimate, so personal, so varying. What I do know is this: home doesn’t have to be where you are from. It can be where you belong. Where you find it. Where you make it.
Where is home for you?