Topic: Home...

[interloper]

I was always one of those people who never really moved far from home.
I lived 40 miles from where i grew up for the last 10 yrs of my life ( I'm 33).
I was always given a hard time by my friends for not really moving out of state.
We had an informal gathering of friends who met to remember a teen-age/ young
adult friend who was killed in '93.  While at this gathering I began to talk to people
about where they lived at.  It was funny to see that alot of them live in des moines
the same as I do or within about a 1/2 hour drive of Indianola, which is the town I
grew-up near.  In the course of talking I asked why they moved back so soon and
the #1 answer i got was this was home and it was where they want to raise their
kids. The reason for this post is that i was listening to a comic on a local radio station
and they were making fun of Iowa. "Iowa is alot like Indiana, they just want you to
gas up and leave...."  A comment was made that Iowa has no "Huge" attraction.
I thought it was kinda funny, yet very true.  The thing most of the nation does not
understand about Iowa is it is not a mecca for young people, it is a mecca for families.
I have to say I am glad for it.

What about your home town?  I would like some feedback from you folks on yours!

[Gambler]

The entire concept of home is something my wife and I disagree on.  Unlike her, I don't have a particular town or even radius around a town that I feel tied to as home.

In my mind, home is where my wife and daughter are.  Even if it's in a place that I don't necessarily like, it's home. 

I will say that even though it is home at the moment, I don't like where I am now and would be more comfortable back in the western US.  Someplace more hospitibable to people whose great grandparents weren't born there.

[E_Look]

Boys, I was born and raised in Chinatown, U..., uh, New York.

I am now living about twenty or so miles outside of city limits but have lived elsewhere in the U.S.

I came back partly because it was "home" (though now it's so different) in that most of my relatives were there.

It isn't really such a good place for families unless you are either in one of the more middle class neighborhoods or 'burbs (becoming rarer and rarer).  I don't have to vent on the lack of family and moral values in inner city locales.  But contrary to what some (younger) people might think, the upscale areas are also atrocious for raising families for the some of the same reasons!  It's just that they do it wearing nicer clothes.

In short, "home" is gone.  My home no longer exists except as a memory.  But I try to make my present home that for my kids.  My wife would like to sell our house when we get really old; I told them I want to be buried (albeit at a ripe, old, old age) in the backyard, "Here Lies Your Great-Great-Great Grandpa, Kids, and No Spitting, Ballplaying, Swearing, or Drinking Against Headstone, Though You may Loiter, but Get Inside in Time for Dinner"

[Capt. Mike]

My home town is Tonawanda, NY (115 Delaware St and 88 Overbrook Dr were the two houses I was raised in), but have lived here in LaVista NE for the last 11 years.  My family and I have moved all over the world in the course of my USAF career, and to be honest, the only reason I'm here is because I got a decent paying job after retirement.  I would love to move back to western NY, but won't as long as my wife is working for the Lutheran Food Pantry network in Omaha.  She is a Parrish Ministry Associate, and this is her calling.

Mike

[AlienLXIX]

Like Gambler my home is where my family is and that's where ever the US Navy takes us! 

Waipahu, Hawaii on the island of Oahu was my home till I was about 22.  It was where I felt safest when I was younger.  I remember this low wide tree that I would climb so that I could get up on the roof of my house and look out over to Pearl Harbor.  I used to watch the USS Nimitz be towed into port when ever she visited.  I also use to sneak out of my home just so I could lay on my roof and look at the stars.  When I left it was only my mother and her father living in a rather large 5 bedroom home; mom had to sell it and move after grandpa died, she said it was just to big for her to come home alone too.  I have to admit I cried.  It was only 3 months older than I was.  I have since gone back and I have to say I'm glad mom didn't stay there.  It looks like there are about three crack houses in the neighborhood.  

I was only in Virginia for about 5 years before Steve brought us back to Hawaii, he too grew up here in the islands, but even after such a short time my island home just doesn't feel like home anymore and that saddens me.  So now I have settelled my "HOME" in Steve's heart since that is where I belong anyway!

[Gambler]

I suppose part of my disconnect from a "home" is the fact that as a child my parents moved quite a lot.  To the point, during 36 years of marriage they lived in 40+ different homes.  Take into consideration that there were instances where it was 6 years in a house hear, 4 years there, etc and you've got other years where we didn't have time to unpack.  From 73 to 93 they lived in a three county area of southern Idaho so that could be considered my "home" but the problem is that all of my family has since left.  So there is nothing familial to draw me back there.  Other than my wife's family lives there.  But that's a draw for her, not me.

It always strikes me as wild when I run into people who are living in the same house their parents owned when they were born.  I can't relate.

[Clark Kent]

Boys, I was born and raised in Chinatown, U..., uh, New York.

Am I to take it you're <gasp> Asian?
Dude, why you been holding out on me?  Can't you send a few of them fine Asian ladies my way?
Please?

Home for me is Minnesota.  My hometown isn't a place i like to be associated with anymore, due to the callous nature of it's inhabitants, disregard for anything of historical significance, lack of care for anything but the largest chain stores and complete intolerance of anyone under a certain economic level.
I'll probably learn to call northern MN home one day, once I can't stand the area around the cities anymore.

[S'Raek]

I was born and raised in and around Springfield, Ohio so to me that is "home."  But I haven't lived there since 1984 when I joined the Navy.  Since then I've lived in Guam, Washington state, Okinawa, Florida, Virginia, Rhode Island and now Italy.  Home is where ever my wife and children are, but when I talk about "back home" has always been Ohio.