Sarnia & Hamilton

Wednesday, January 04, 2006

I haven't written in awhile. Obviously. I went home to the lovely city of Sarnia for the Christmas holidays and fell off the face of the earth. Really, I did... and it was great. Since my program rocks, I got to go home super early and spent almost a month with my family and friends. I just got back to Hamilton yesterday and it’s great to be home. There I said it. Home. I know my mom is either going to kill me or cry when she reads that, but both places feel like home. Last night I couldn’t sleep. I was laying awake thinking about the meaning of life…okay okay, you got me: I was totally excited for school, how silly is that? But the fact remains that I couldn’t sleep. In an afternoon, my life was altered drastically. I felt like I was thrown into a crazy vortex or something and ended up in a completely new life. Here, let me try to explain how different life is…
Sarnia: I drive around in my parents Volvo station wagon whenever I need to go anywhere, eat all I can of my mom’s delicious dinner, play more family games in that time than the rest of the world combined, never go on the computer, attend church Sunday mornings and get to hang out with my boyfriend until he's sick of me.
Hamilton: I take the HSR with my cool bus pass whenever it doesn’t drive past me, eat peanut butter toast-everyday, sometimes multiple times a day, study until I want to cry, my computer is my most prized possession and msn my best friend, attend church Sunday evenings and maybe I get to see my boyfriend every 9 days or so.
And yet, although the difference between the two cities is striking, I can’t help but feel at home in both. (Maybe the pollution in both cities makes me feel at home?) It’s weird how that happens. If home is where your heart is, I guess mine is split in two, right down the middle. And yet, even though both places are comfortable, the weird thing is they are both ending, and soon. Hypothetically, I’m only in Hamilton for another year and a bit, and my house in Sarnia won’t always be mine. One day I’ll come home and my room will be an office, or a gym, or maybe a scrapbooking room. Reality is that home is really in a transition phase right now. My friend (can I call you that? J) Pernell spoke about this transition phase for University/College students at the beginning of December. It got me thinking. Where will home be in that year and a bit? What is home, what does it mean to me? I think for me, home is being with the people that I love. It’s not really the place (house or city) that matters; it’s the experience with the people that mean the most to me. I have both my immediate and Pearl street family. Home can mean so many different things to different people. Despite the chaotic life I lead at present with so many changes, I am going to take solace in the fact that home is so much more than a building or street sign. Home is being with the people take make my life worth living each day.

posted by Rachel Pede @ 12:41 AM   2 comments