Home is the place where, when you have to go there,
They have to take you in.
Robert Frost
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This famous line is from a Frost poem called “The Death of a Hired Man,” published in 1914.
Things were very different then. People didn’t travel, didn’t move away; families were much closer. The rebellious son who moved away for better circumstances and failed would be faced with this situation: go back home? Home was always there. And they would welcome you. But why was it you moved away? Well…
Things are much more complex now; or rather, they are more realistic now, the complexities of human nature becoming expressed, rather than repressed. The idea of an essential connection, with a family, can’t be denied. But the idea of family has greatly expanded. There are many people now who don’t identify with their parental family, but who identify with others like themselves who are not baseline heterosexual. Those people who sought to return home, because they were different and failed, have these days found their own families, and are living happily, in their own families. Even if it takes some time to discover them.
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Phil Collins: Take Me Home
A powerful song, one I’ve known for some 40 years.
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Peter Gabriel: Solsbury Hill
But this one is the best. It appeals to a basic sf/fantasy theme, the idea of being alone and unappreciated, and how maybe one could be discovered, and taken away.
“Grab your things I’ve come to take you home!”
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My home is now where I live with my partner, and where we have connections to his sons and their cousins in the Bay Area. I don’t have close connections with any of my immediate family. Their homes are not my home, and they certainly wouldn’t think of me as their home, whatever the circumstances. I have a sentimental connection to where I grew up, in Apple Valley CA, as expressed here.
