Where the heart is

When I think of home, I think of the place where I grew up. My parents moved at the end of 2000 and again at the end of 2006. Ever since that first relocation I've resisted saying that I'm going home whenever I'm to visit them. Instead I'll mention that I'm going where my parents are. After all, their out of state residence isn't home because I lack any connection or roots to the place. It's merely a house where family lives. Maybe that's a weird differentiation to make. Maybe it isn't.

Staying at my parents' for a few days has been like being a tourist in some regards. They've felt more of a need to entertain me or show me around than surely would have been the case if they were still at my childhood home. This is only the second time I've been here and the first non-holiday stop I've made, so I suppose I'm still in an acclimation period.

They're far enough away from where I'm from that there can be a bit of a disconnect in seeing what's around, hearing how people talk, and noticing all the small local details that differ slightly but significantly from the familiar to be a little jarring. It isn't culture shock but trying to figure out how these people I'm with got planted in this new environment.

Perhaps it is easier to feel like I'm at home when I can bring my own with me via a connection to the internet and an iPod that carries a substantial portion of my music collection. My parents have satellite television, so I can watch the Reds games just as I could if they lived where I called home as a kid and where I live now. Things that used to be limited to an area or were not as portable can now be accessed from or toted to practically anywhere on the planet.

While home is a physical location, it is also a state of mind constructed by the people one is around. This place, some three hours or so from where I was raised, will never be home in a geographic sense, but I've come to realize that it is the more enduring kind of home. In the end, isn't that what matters most?