Home Sweet...Home?

They say that once you leave home, you can never truly go back. I was blindsided with this realization the first time I made the trek from my new home in Wilmington back to good old Doylestown, Ohio; home of farms, fishing ponds, and one stoplight.

Excited to be going home to see my family and friends and take in the country air, I was surprised to find myself feeling awkward and uncomfortable. Upon my arrival, I felt a new sense of unease take over. The cornfields seemed smaller, the dirt roads had been paved, and they added a new stop sign. Even the cows looked at me differently, a slightly glazed look with no hint of recognition, their spots dark and unfamiliar.

As we pulled into the driveway, I felt my heart beat a little bit faster, unsure why. After being greeted by warm hugs and kisses and shown the latest renovations, my heart sank a little. My home, the house that I had spent the better part of my life in, wasn't the home that I remembered so fondly. My bedroom had been renovated into an art room for my mother's budding passion for painting. And after being introduced to the newest addition to the family, a 170 pound Great Dane named Elizabeth, I was told I could sleep in the family room with the cat.


After taking a day or two to get settled, the awkward feeling eased up a bit, yet I still felt more like I was a visitor in my parents' home. As much as I loved being with my family, I longed to go back to Wilmington...to my home. It saddened me to think that the place where I had grown up now felt so alien to me. What had happened in those six months that changed my feelings of home so drastically?

Besides my new found independence, I still felt like the same small-town girl. I still had the same friends and went to the same bars, but it felt different somehow; as if I were a stranger that was playing my old role. As relaxing as I'd hoped my visit home would be, it stressed me out to feel so foreign in the one place where I thought I would always feel completely at ease.

On my last day there, I went out to the hammock to take a nap. Being out in that country air, breathing in the fresh-cut grass and watching the sun set over the fields was something that had not changed. It brought back that familiar feeling. The love I had growing up and the freedom of my summers to roam through the countryside. I realized that while life can change us, our past is still full of our memories. And holding on to those memories can always bring me back home.