A Home That Our Feet May Leave…

Where we love is home – home that our feet may leave, but not our hearts. – Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

 

As a self-proclaimed vagabond, I do not think of any one house or city as home (though I will always identify as a Texan, no matter how many miles are in between me and it). Instead I have several places that belong to my heart and soul. There are the places that I have loved living in or traveling to, and there are the places that I long to see with my own eyes, like the British Isles. When I look at pictures of Co. Clare, Ireland or the Isle of Skye there is something inside of me that stirs, something that says “that is home, you belong there.” It is such an absurdly strong feeling, one that has caused me to cry on more than one occasion. Why, I have asked myself, would I desire a place I have never been to in such an extreme fashion? It is not just because it is beautiful, for Fiji and Italy are beautiful as well, but I am not filled with that sense of home when I see them; lust yes, belonging no. I believe that it has something to do with the fact that my people come from there, that it is in my DNA.

 

I have no proof of this, of course, no scientific research that says it is true; if there is, I have no knowledge of it. All I know is that where I crave to go, and the places that feel right to me, are the places that either are or are like where my ancestors lived. I think that part of what makes us, us, is passed down from generation to generation. Whether it be love of the ocean, mountains, hot weather, or open plains, there is something in our familial past that can influence our desires. The same thing that causes a child to have the quirks or mannerisms of a grandparent or parent they never knew, I believe drives our need to seek out the homeland of our families, and allows us to feel at home in the places that closely resemble them.

 

I challenge anyone who has knowledge of where they are from, to look at pictures of their ancestral home (or, better yet, to go there) and not feel something powerful calling to you. If you are American, travel to the states that your family first settled in. If you already live in the land of your people, open your eyes to what surrounds you, connect to your past. In a world that changes at the blink of an eye, and one that pushes us towards a homogenized civilization, it is important to know our histories, and our cultures. To know from where we come not only gives us a sense of knowing ourselves, it makes up the very heart of our beings.