building home (pt 1)

As many of you may know, i've been M.I.A. for a spell on account of going back to the U.S. for a couple weeks. I'm now back in Vietnam, where I've slipped back into the fold of work, early mornings, motorbikes, and my cozy little apartment with its cozy brown and pink bed. But I've found that, even though I'm glad to be back in the rhythm of the life I've created, I miss the life I left.

Home has occupied a good part of my waking thoughts the past three weeks. Not just in the physical sense; I've been turning over the concept of home in my head over and over again, trying to find some nuance, some definitive trait to attach to it. Having lived much of my life jumping from culture to culture, tongue to tongue, east to west, north to south, palm trees to pine trees, Roman Catholic to Agnostic to a Somewhat Baptist... home has never been a concrete, stable thing for me. And there have been plenty of times when I wish where it could something much more enduring, much more palpable and, dare I say it, inescapable.

I fantasize about taking home for granted. I sometimes envy those folks who are rooted down to a place so firmly they become part of the landscape. I long for messy, tangled, deep roots like that.

As it is, I run like water through people, places, and experiences. Of course, I'd be a fool to not recognize -- and be grateful for -- the amazing relationships, food, photos, and stories that have come as a direct result of my ability to just pick up and start over at the snap of a finger. I'm resourceful, disciplined, and fulfilled in ways I could never have imagined being as a young(er) girl. This -- this person I've become and am still becoming -- is the sort of change I've longed for for a long time.

Yet still, when thoughts wander back home, a gap forms in my head, in my mouth, and in my hands, and I can't find the words to articulate this thing I feel like I only vaguely know.

Home is something that's been molded and reformed, analyzed, broken apart and put back together again, over and over again.

Just like me, I guess.