I have joined a Facebook group, Virginia and Virginia Photographers and I am enjoying both posting and seeing what others post. I am not from here, but I have grown to feel comfortable here. Northern Virginia, the DC metro area is a modern world Capital, an easy place for me to be comfortable. Rural Virginia is harder for me, generations of racism, sexism and isolation make it culturally and socially backward.
The simple question, where are you from, often brings an answer from me of "that's complicated." I have lived in 5 states, mid-west, southwest, south east and mid-Atlantic. I have no desire to return to the place I was born in Michigan, if not for family I would almost never visit. Phoenix was 55 years ago, though the landscape still makes me homesick. I will be forever connected to Florida (I have a professional license there,) but I have no desire to return to living in the hurricane zone, and the conservative nutters have taken over state government. I will be forever connected to Kentucky (I have a professional license there,) but we never wanted to live there, we went there for opportunities (that treated us VERY WELL.) So here I am in the DC burbs, for a dozen plus years now. My job requires me to live here, and I hope the job lasts another 3 years (then I will retire - promise!) But is it home?
So is home where I am now? Where I am from? If so which place that I am from? Where I want to be? My father use to answer, "home is where I hang my hat, and I don't wear a hat anymore."
For me, for now, feeling a connection to a place, feeling intune with the season and the landscape, makes me feel at home.
Do you live in a place that feels like home for you?
I live exactly where I want to live. I used to think about living in another country but no longer.
ReplyDeleteImmigration and language issues, living in another country has to be real challenge.
DeleteFor me home has often been where I was at the time, but sometimes not even then.
ReplyDeleteWhere you are appears to be very pleasant, I think I could feel comfortable there (once I learned enough of the language to hold a conversation.)
DeleteThat’s a loaded question. Love our house, dislike our neighborhood, hate our town, like our state, but want to live somewhere else, in a “walkable” neighborhood with shops, restaurants, etc. We’re here because of our jobs (we’re state employees so have to at least stay in the state) but plan to move as soon as we’re both retired (most probably to Massachusetts.) But we have always made where we live home as much as possible, and I’m more attached to my husband and dogs than I am our location, so as long as they’re with me, I’m good.
ReplyDeleteSassybear
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I wish there was more within walking distance for us. The biggest reason I own a car, is grocery shopping, that would be very difficult without a car.
DeleteHome is where I am, though, like you, there are places I've lived that I long to go back to, and places I've lived that I never care to see again.
ReplyDeleteA few places I have visited that I never want to go back to also
DeleteI AM home in my birth city.
ReplyDeletehated the DC area (lived there for 20 years).
I would have bet you felt at home there
DeleteHmmmm... Cleveland has a specific sense of familiarity, less so since so much has changed since I grew up there. Duke actually produces certain feelings of home for me. I love it here in DC, and I think it's starting to feel like home. I think I never had strong home attachments; I very much like what your father said.
ReplyDeleteDuke is wonderful, but it is so close to NC.
DeleteYes, I do! I really do feel like the desert is home even if I grew up in Illinois. However, if someone plopped me down in London, I bet I would feel at home there too.
ReplyDeleteAt one point, I had several trips to London in just a few years, and it easily feels like home away from home.
DeleteFor me, the province of my birth (Manitoba) is where my roots are, yet I'm happy living in another province now (Alberta). Alberta is "home" but Manitoba is "HOME," if you get the difference.
ReplyDeletePlaces I should visit, yes I get Home and home,
DeleteHaving grown up in MI (with all my relations there) that is home.
ReplyDeleteI will probably retire there too.