Home Is Not a Place...
It’s a feeling. It’s a quote many have heard often, so often in fact that it sounds like a crappy cliche. But it’s a reality many of us face when we move away from home, whether it’s completely abroad or just a few houses down. Living away from family brings many good and bad situations for each person, but it is never a super easy decision of just taking all our stuff and moving away.
It’s a thought process that for me started when I was around 12. I saw this documentary on TV about Haute Couture and told my parents that when I grow up, I’ll live in New York City and will be a major designer. Of course, I don’t live in New York City, and I haven’t even graduated a design course 14 years after this statement, but I have lived away from my family for 7 years and a half, and I don’t know if it ever ‘gets easier’, in fact, I find it has a way of getting harder with every trip home.
I first left for a longer period of time for summer school when I was about 13-14. I came to London and enjoyed every.single.second of it, and my immature brain thought that’s it, a super amazing, shiny rainbow-filled dream come to reality. Then I was volunteering and found out about this amazing exchange program where you could spend a year in a different country and boy did I beg and plead to go, as it seemed like the perfect ‘escape’. I sound like a horrid teenager, but I promise I was a nice one.
When I was 17, I flew to Canada, to a small city called Alma, and proceeded to have one of the best years of my life until that point. It was ‘The Great Escape’ in many words, but it has mostly brought perspective. The idea that you go somewhere to escape your parents simply wasn’t true for me. I realized that in my immature brain I thought that’s what the point of living abroad was, not being grounded because you arrived home 3 hours after curfew, or wore Converse trainers on the snowiest day of the year and got the worst cold of the century.
Nope, these things were things I thought about when I was 16-17 and haven’t done anything remotely as difficult as not seeing my parents for 7 months out of the year. I was so excited to be there that I didn’t notice it in the first 2-3 months, but then December came over, and like a train, it hit me. I missed home. It was insanely hard to go through Christmas in a host family, far away from my parents and brother, and I think if you’ve never gone through this, you can’t understand how you feel like a part of you is missing.
According to many, when you move abroad, you have to ‘forget’ about where you come from, in order for your acclimatisation to the new environment to work well, but nobody tells you properly how you feel you belong to a million places all at once, but to none of them to the fullest afterward. Yes, in my excitement of being abroad I did very briefly forget about ‘home’, but that didn’t mean I didn’t miss my parents terribly and cry in my pillow wondering if it will always be that hard and if this is just the first time and I have to rip it like a band-aid, and it will get better afterwards. Little did I know then…
I ripped the band-aid that time in Canada, and every single time I went home and moved out ever since because there is no band-aid that you can rip so you don’t miss your family any longer. Because the truth is, every time you go home, even for a few days, the band-aid comes back, and you have to rip it all over again when you leave. And every time you mention ‘home’ you have to specify which home, and this won’t change for as long as you live far from your family. It’s something many young people like myself struggle with intensely, especially throughout university, when you are far from home most of the time for the first time in your life. Not many people get the chance to get a taster like I did two years before I went to university.
But, even with a taster session, I can’t say I have found it easier to process not only everything that is going on where I am at the moment but also the fact that my family is far away and will always be far away. It’s a hard thought to process, and I want people who live close to their families to seriously count their lucky stars because it’s a privilege denied to many, but it is also a choice. Could I have stayed in Romania? Probably… would I have been truly happy and fulfilled? Highly unlikely, but it is something I will probably never know unless in the future we will be able to live two lives and trial out our opposing choices.
My parents knew that from before that moment at 12 when I specified I want to live in New York City, they always encouraged me to find my wings and fly, even if that meant it was far from them because realistically it was always more important to them that I was finding that happiness and fulfilment, than if I lived anywhere near them.
Before 2020 I remember their excitement to come and visit me in my flat in London, to see where is this place I made a home these past 7 years, what it means to me, to discover fun things to do around here and experience them with me, even if I’ve been to that place many times before. By taking them to my favourite spots I could now make them picture where I was on a random Sunday in March, or the flowers I bought from that specific market close to my house, or the lovely lady that sells the Big Issue next to the tube station that knows me by name by now. It’s those small things that make me and my parents know I have made the right decision, even if I will end up over the years missing birthdays, anniversaries, and other moments because I can’t always travel back on a random Tuesday in December. But finding that happiness and that fulfilment, and the knowledge that I am supported no matter where I am on this globe is something that until you have lived far away you can’t fully grasp.
The rewards are many, but so are the sacrifices, and all those people telling you that you don’t understand every time you come home for a brief moment don’t see you crying every time you board a plane leaving your parents waving at the gate, they don’t see that limb that you always feel is missing, all those hugs you have foregone, all those ‘happy birthdays’ received virtually, and all those moments you have missed.
Living far away from family is difficult, as much as it sometimes is rewarding, as you have gone to get that something better, to fulfil your craziest dreams on most occasions, and it is unbelievable how this creates such an amazing web of support around you. However, if before this year everyone was a flight away, in 2020, and by the looks of it at least a part of 2021, everyone is maximum a call away. I haven’t seen my family now in 7 months, and, even though I have done this at least once before (but I must admit it has happened on quite a few occasions in the past 7 years), I can’t say I find it easier, I just pretend it is because this will likely happen again in the future, and not due to Covid.
Choosing my holidays and who I spend them with will always be a choice between my family from ‘home home’ and whoever I am spending that holiday with, but I know that the choice to leave was ultimately mine and that my parents, as far as they have always been incredible anchors of support, even if virtually for most of the time, will understand. Living away from family doesn’t make me special, or broken, but it makes me have a different approach to a lot of the things I do, and it made me understand, since my first escapade abroad that living far from them is not to escape, but to dream and achieve things that maybe I couldn’t have done by staying. Living far away has also strengthened the relationship I have with my parents and brother, I feel it is a different bond that I would have never managed to have by staying, and I count myself lucky that I was able to have that freedom of choice that many can’t even dream of having.
I never ended up moving to New York, and I most likely never will, as my heart definitely belongs to this continent (despite this island wanting to leave it), but living abroad and being ‘that immigrant’ has made me proud of my roots, of that country I call home, of my family and how they raised me. And yes, I will miss birthdays, Christmas, New Years’, anniversaries and a lot of events in the lives of family and friends, but I know that these sacrifices, even though not small ones, will find a reward, if not now, in the future. And all those virtual hugs, kisses, and tears cried silently will find their way to be a lesson in love, in support, and in finding happiness wherever I may be and however far I’ll be from my family.
So yes, home is not a place, because how can it be for all of us who are ‘displaced’, but it is a feeling because we have that warmth when we get to a new spot and we know that yes, I’ll call this one home, and keep that ‘home-home’ wherever I came from, and I’ll have home 2.0 where I was before, and so on. I have believed for a long time that I will always be tied to that home I was brought up in, but truth be told, living away from that place for quite some time, home is the thing you create for yourself, it doesn’t need to be an actual dot on the map, and that is the beauty of this quote and the importance of stepping out and looking at all the amazing feelings that are around you that make up this home. I know each of us feels it differently, but if you ever feel lost, give in and listen to that feeling, it will always lead you home…
Written by Andra Maier
Working in fashion teaches you a lot of things, but it leaves little space for creativity outside of work, because we are ‘always available’. Having a creative space is something important in my ‘switching off’ process, and writing comes easiest, especially in busy times. I love everything fashion and food related. If I am not found writing or scribbling, I am found reading the latest fiction releases, fan-girling over Harry Potter or some pretty shoes, and writing for my blog. Being able to express myself outside of work boundaries is freeing and incredible, and honing the creative spirit is one of the main resolutions I had for 2020.