The long road home...

Home is a concept I have struggled with most of my life. It's hard when you grow up moving around every couple of years. You yearn for order, stability, and a place to call home. You envy those who know where they are from, and dread being asked that very same question. You roll your eyes when people say "they understand" because they had to change neighborhoods within the same city...

While I knew that I was Colombian by blood, I also knew I was Mexican by birth. However, I never fully identified with either. In many ways, I still don't. And yet, it seems like the further away I move, the more I understand, embrace, and learn what "home" really is. Home is not a place, it's a feeling, it's a group of people, a sense of belonging. It is the intangibility of home that makes it so appealing. While we cannot really take it with us, in some small way, we do.

I have once again decided to move, not closer to home, but further away. While to some it may seem that I am incapable of "staying put" and others would argue that I simply do not want to "settle down," I would argue that it's neither. The truth is that I am learning to be at home with myself, wherever that may be. I recognize that there are moments when living abroad and far from family can be incredibly lonely and miss those special people every single day. I am also incredibly thankful for the many people I have met along the way, my ever changing (and growing) family, my home.

While some think of home as a place, I've found home in the people I've met along the way. The friends I make and the lessons they inevitably teach me. I have become who am I mostly because of the people that have been a part of my life, even those who were only around for a short time. The next chapter, I expect, will be no different. My home will continue to wander with me, weaving in and out of suitcases and furnished apartments. It may not be the ideal home, but for me, it works.