That feeling of being at home

©MCD

There is a serenity in finding a place you can call home. Because no matter how many buses, trains, airplanes you need to get there, it is all worth the tiredness when you finally reach it. It is a place you hold dear in your heart because you know it will always welcome you back, no matter how far you go or how long it takes for you to return.

It is even greater if you have friends who will always be waiting for you and who will get out of their way to make you feel like home, because that is exactly where you feel you are. A family is one that extends beyond blood ties. And those friends who are geographically distant from you are sometimes the ones who are the closest. You will talk for hours about everything and always be up to date with each others’ lives. They will always have some wise advice to share and that optimism that everything will be all right and life will find its way to give you want you deserve.

There are places that mark our lives. Places where we wished we could live forever, as long or short a period that word connotes. There are places that don’t really change with time, but that is perfectly OK with us because you don’t want them to change (only if it is for the better). There are places other people tell you they visited on a travel streak and you are proud to say, ‘I know it, I lived there, it is like home’.

There are places where no matter your absence, whenever you return, you know exactly where everything is and where to go, where the hidden gems are, and where to find the best views. As if coming back home.

And if you are lucky enough to find such a place with friends who have become family, you are blessed with having a home away from home, one that will offer you peace and tranquillity, a place to crash (literally and metaphorically) and the strength to regroup yourself so you can return to ‘normality’ stronger and more optimistic.