I live in Des Moines, Iowa, 250 miles and 3 ½ hours from Prior Lake, Minnesota, where I grew up, for 8 months out of the year. That leaves only 3 extremely busy months over the summer and 1 month during the winter for me to spend time in the town that housed my childhood. For many people at Drake, Des Moines has become their new home, the place they would rather be if they got to choose. However, as I drove home tonight, listening to Kenny Chesney with my window rolled down, breathing in the cool, clean air, laden only with the smell of bonfires all around the area, I couldn’t help but think that, after 8 months, I’ve finally come home.
“Home” has a very different definition to each individual person. As I mentioned, many people at Drake feel their new home is Des Moines, the place where they spend the vast majority of their year and a common place to meet and hang out with all of their new—and sometimes old—friends. For a close friend of mine, home is where he grew up, where he feels most at home, the place he loves, and, unfortunately for me and a few others close to him, it’s a place that’s 17 hours away from where we met him and spent all of our time together. For another friend of mine, home is a place she’s been to many times, but never truly lived. It’s somewhat more of an idea than a geographic place. She has a sort of template with guidelines for where she feels most at home, but she has never actually resided in that setting for more than a week or two at a time.
As for me, “home” is much more general, and abstract. Home is the place I go when I get tired of the bustle and stress of school, work, or general life problems. When I go home, I feel welcomed, and loved. People know me by name and genuinely care about me and how I’m doing, how my life is going. I know that, no matter what’s going right or wrong, no matter what happens to me, I can go home and someone will always be there to support me and help me, whether friends or family. Home is not just the house in which I live for 4 months out of the year or the dorm I spend 8 months in; my home moves to wherever my friends or family are together. I can be “at home” in my house, my friends’ houses, on a boat, at a bonfire, in a car…anywhere, really. Time spent in a certain location only affects the location of my home in the sense that more time spent there equates to more time strengthening bonds with people who define and create my home. I could live anywhere for any amount of time, but if I don’t create and strengthen bonds with people close to me, I will never be able to consider that place my home.
So, to all you Prior Lake/Savagers out there, take this as a compliment, most likely one of the highest you will ever receive from me. Never have I felt so “at home” as when I came home to all of you.
Written 5/27/2010...from within my home
© 2007-2010 Jacob Tauer
This information is not to be used in any form, online or off, without the express permission of the author
