Home Slice
I believe home is wherever you want it to be.
My whole life has been stretched across the world. Torn between two nations and constantly questioning who I am and where home is. My father is from North Yorkshire, England, and my mother is native to the Salt Lake Valley of Utah. These places are vastly different and yet so uniquely stunning and striking. The sun rises each morning over the immense mountains of Salt Lake City. Their shadows cast around the valley, their darkness caresses the homes below. The great mountains are an escape from the city into a haven of tranquility above. This is my home.
Over 4,000 miles away the same sun rises across an emerald world. The golden and green fields fit together perfectly like majestic puzzles pieces made by God. A cow groans a good morning moo in the distance and a small cottage older than the American nation itself stands sturdy under the forever falling curtain of shining rain and dew. This is my home.
Ever since I was about 8 or 9, my family has spent 8 months in Utah, only to pack up and embark on an English adventure every summer and winter. My whole life has been divided by this coming and going, my heart split in two by the Atlantic Ocean. I used to hate this. Life seemed to always be filled with goodbyes. To friends, home, life, sun and summer memories. But I had to step back and think. I’m so lucky to have this chance and the two cultures that make me who I am. As I have grown up, I have stopped realizing the bitterness and sorrow of a good-bye and now I like to think that with every goodbye, there is the blossoming of an entirely more worthwhile hello.
I have come to believe that all of our lives are like special recipes. All of our experiences, memories, aspirations and beliefs are the ingredients. I believe that home is where you stop and gather these ingredients, where you bake your recipe. Home can be anywhere you chose. It does not have to be where you were born or where you want to end up. Home can grow and morph into a different place. It changes for you, for a new recipe, or a new ingredient.
Home is inside of us, a slice of our eternity filled with memories and peace. I believe that we all have a home, maybe its not exactly a place, but a state of mind, somewhere that you can always go and relax, be free, and be yourself.
Although I have grown up in two separate places, and two countries so different, yet similar, home is always there. England and Utah are together with me and my life is still growing, adding more ingredients with every day. Take the time. Go home.