So, I just got back to Los Angeles after ten days back home. Well, back in Grand Rapids, I don’t think I can call it home anymore. Which was kind of a stark realization. I mean, this is the place I grew up. This is where I learned to walk, talk. Where I went to Kindergarten, to high school. This is where my family lives. And still—it’s not my home. Not anymore.

And it’s not because I live in LA now. LA isn’t my home. I live here. I work here. I’ve started to build a life here. But it’s not my home. I don’t have a home. Not anymore.

I think that’s what happens. As you get older, as you live longer, as you live fuller. You live and you leave pieces of yourself as you go. You leave pieces of yourself, your heart in different places, with different people. You’re scattered. You, your heart, your soul—you’re scattered across places, across people. You don’t have a home anymore because your heart lives so many places. You live so many places.

So, what do you do? What do you do when you have no home? Well, you learn. You learn to create one. You learn to make yourself your home.

You learn that home isn’t a place anymore. Home is not a place. Home is people. Home is love. The older you get, the more you realize that home is not a place you go but a feeling you carry with you. The people you’ve loved, the places you’ve been.

The person you’ve become.

So, really, you can be home anywhere. You can be home in Grand Rapids. You can be home in Los Angeles. You can be home in a box in Fiji. Because home doesn’t have to be a place anymore. Home is where your people are. Home is where you love. And that can be anywhere. You just need your people. You need yourself. And you need love. That’s it. That’s home.

And that’s pretty neat.

(Also, you need my dog, Baxter, but he’s mine, so that sucks for you guys. Happy Wednesday!)

Home is where the heart is, kids….or whenever I’m with these creatures.