HOME—whether it is a palace on a hill or a studio apartment—is a huge concept. My childhood home is frozen in time just as it was when I was 8, 11,13, 16… With no reason to return to it, I know that seeing what subsequent families did to the house and garden would be a useless, and perhaps cruel, experience. Why muck with the memories?
I’m starting my final day of my trip to Portugal. My head is filled with tiled walls, sunny skies, and castles. My belly is full of grilled sardines, egg custard pastries, and wine. My suitcase if full of dirty clothes and an odd assortment of souvenirs. I will go to a museum today with an impressive collection and then treat myself to an afternoon of wandering around without a plan, followed by an evening of Fado with my travel friend. It’s going to be a great day, but there will be a piece of me that is already heading home to NYC, to regular blog posts, freelance writing assignments, the gym before my morning coffee, my cuddly cat, and all the routines & people that make my life at HOME mine.
This trip has inspired me. I have story ideas and, after this short hiatus, I’m ready to get back to writing at my usual pace. Today, I’ll ponder home and what it means in storytelling. It is the center, the family cave, the royal palace, the hut, the suburban house, a tiled row house in Porto, the Moorish Castle in Sintra, and the setting for millions of stories of all kinds.
Traveling is always such a pleasure, but nothing beats that feeling of coming home after being away for a while. Even though my parents are still in the home I grew up in, it’s changed a lot in some ways over the years.
I’m finally HOME and now I’ve got piles of laundry to do, bills to pay, phone calls to make and yet… I’m still glad to be home.
HOME as a concept, as an ideal oasis, is a powerful idea. HOME can also be a scary place you run from or return to only to face the ghosts or demons of your past. There are so many stories when HOME is a central figure, almost more than a character. We run away on quests to find ourselves and click those ruby slippers when we realize we had everything we needed at home.