I don’t have a family home. We didn’t have one when I was a kid, and my parents were still together, and that didn’t change after they got divorced.
I started my life in one place, I spent most of my childhood in another one, finished my high school years in a third one (with a brief stint in a fourth one), and for the past decade or so I’ve been living up here, in my fifth one. I know the journey won’t end here and I’ll for sure move again, one day.
Every time I changed houses, I also moved to a different environment. These were not different houses in the same city. I started in a small country town, then moved to the city, then out again in a different small town country town, and now I’m up here, in this tiny little village nestled on the side of the mountains, surrounded by woods.
In none of these stops did I ever feel at home. Places where I lived, sure, but not homes. Will I ever feel at home somewhere? That remains to be seen, I guess.
The idea of finding refuge somewhere is something that I have always found fascinating. I have a deep passion for all the shacks, old cabins, and small ruined structures that are scattered across the woods here where I live.
Traces of lives from the past, when people were living at a different pace, spending most of their days out in nature. Sometimes I wonder how I would feel living a life like that.
Another thing I love, speaking of sheltering, are caves. There are a bunch of those around here. Some of them are natural—there’s quite a big one not too far from where I live—but the majority are man-made, relics from the World War era.
There’s something fascinatingly primordial in caves. The other day, I was sitting inside one, listening to the rain that was pouring outside, watching the sea of trees in the distance, the clouds running above them, and I felt great. It’s an odd feeling. I wanted to stay there, light up a fire, spend the day in that little hole in the mountain, like a hobbit (I’m way too tall to be a hobbit though. Also, no hairy feet.). Maybe one day I’ll do it.
But even inside that little hole in the rock, I could feel the desire to have a place for myself. A place I know I can come back to, a place in which I can find refuge.
I don’t know if I’ll ever find that place. Sometimes I think my life will take me in odd directions, and who knows what will happen. But other times I feel I will find it, and for the first time in my life, I’ll have a home, and not just a house.
And who knows, maybe it’s gonna be a cabin in the woods. I know Cody would love that.
— M