My father would have told you that "home is where I hang my hat, and I don't wear a hat anymore".
Where am I from is a complicated answer. I was born in Michigan, north of Detroit out in middle of nowhere. I lived in Phoenix for a short time as a child. Then back to Michigan. I went to half of high school in Michigan, and half of it in Florida, changing schools 10 times in the last five years of my public school education. I lived in central Florida for almost two decades after high school. Moved to Lexington Kentucky, went to graduate school in Louisville, living in Kentucky 13 years. I have been in the Washington DC area nearly 14 years. See, that is complicated, and I left some of the details out. For most people it is a simple question. I have met people who lived and died within 100 mile radius. My life has stretched across thousands of miles.
I like to think that all of those moves when I was in school, prepared me for making home, wherever I am. It takes a little time to develop connections and a routine. To learn the local values and customs. To get over saying, "back home we do it differently." Nothing will make the locals hate you faster than telling them that things are better where you came from. When I was in high school in Florida the mother of a friend of mine simply said, there are northbound lanes on I-95, if it is better there, GO! She also said there are two kinds of Yankees, Yankees come here and spend money and we kind of like them, and damned Yankees, move here and try to tell us how to live and we hate them.
Am I done moving? Most likely. There are only a few places I think I would like to live, and despite being fully invested in an expensive housing market, a couple of them are out of our price range (San Francisco.) We have feathered the nest here. We are comfortable. We are Home.
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