Home

What is a home? Some say "A house is not a home", and others say "Home is where the heart is". Is a home truly not where you're at, but who you're with that's important?

This is something I've thought a lot about since coming to college. Spending the majority of my past two years a little more than two and a half hours away from the place I lived in for 18 years of my life will do that do you. In the past few years, I've learned that I am extremely good at adapting to change. I typically make friends quickly and fit in among groups of my peers. I get involved and am charismatic, so that happens.

But the question is-what is a home? I am blessed to have an amazing group of friends down in Maryville. Between the members of clubs like ASL club, history club, friends who share my faith at the Newman Center, my brothers in Kappa Kappa Psi, the wonderful people in my building, or my co-workers in the TDC, I know I've always got a friend I can depend on when I need someone. I have no doubts that I fit in down here and that my happiest moments are genuine with these wonderful people. But then again, my friends back in high school also make me happy. Although I am pretty much the only person from my high school at Northwest, with most of my friends staying in Iowa and others going to states elsewhere, I still connect with them when I'm home. I wish I could communicate better with them, but I am an in-person person so I have to depend on re-connecting in person over breaks.

Anyway, my home at HOME with my family is going to change soon. A few friends of mine came home with me back in January to go to Winter Jam and it occurred to my parents that we didn't really have a place for guests to stay. Our house isn't that big, so when we have friends over we usually all just set up some blow-up mattresses and sleeping bags in the basement. Although my friends coming did not completely cause my parent's decision to move, but it was a contributing factor.
So we're moving. Big whoop, right? Tons of people have moved before. Military families, people who move for better opportunities, moving closer to families, etc. It's not a new thing, and I hate to complain when others have had to move several times throughout their life and had trouble making friends. I know a lot of people like that, and I apologize if you think I'm a wimp for writing this. But I have never lived in any other house but this one. I was born almost 20 years ago and then BOOM! Here's my house. Share a room with my sisters, movie nights in the basement, use the computer in the "computer room", it's always been this way. I grew up in this house and it is the house I refer to as home when I come back from college on breaks.

Now we're moving. Each time I come home, something is different. My room went from purple to white. All the stickers are off my door. Our front door is now blue rather than red. All our VHS's are in storage, as well as our old couch and other things. Usually over breaks, my parents give me chores to do and this week, Spring Break, I'm in charge of deciding what I want to keep and what I want to throw away. Everything else goes into boxes for storage. I guess it's easier, then, for my family to do this whole "sell our house" thing when my older sister and I are away at college. They don't have to worry about us making rooms messy or getting more stuff to bring home.

It's so weird, though, because I'm moving into the Guadelupe House with some of the other girls on the leadership team for the Newman Center in May. There's so much space there, I'm trying to figure out all the stuff I'll need to get and when I can move. At the same time, my family is trying to buy less stuff so we don't have to store it. I will essentially be moving into one house in May, and another house in June. If I have to be completely honest, I don't like it. It's cool that we're fixing up our house, but seeing boxes everywhere is depressing. This is supposed to be my home. I'm supposed to share memories with my future children about this place. My mom's parents did the same thing, moving to a new house after she and her siblings moved out. She has no memories in their current house, making me wonder if that has anything to do with her decision. I don't know, the pictures of houses she likes so far have looked pretty nice. Bedrooms for all of us, nicer kitchen and more space, I would be lying if I didn't say it sounds nice.

I think the main point is that the whole decision to move caught me off-guard. Did I think it was awesome when my parents told me we'd move before I got to 4th grade? Heck yeah! But now it's my home. I won't make anything harder, it's stressful enough for my parents and little sister to be doing so much work on the house without the help of my older sister and I while we're away at school most of the time, but it still makes me feel like mehhh.

But like I said earlier, I adapt to change. It's going to be crazy-weird not to have the neighbors I carol to every year. Crazy weird to not be within running distance of my church and high school. But I believe that home is where the heart is. Eventually I will have my own house that I will call my home, it's bound to happen eventually. Having two new houses to adapt to at once will be difficult, but if I am with the people I love, it is home.