(This is a companion post to Jessica's description of the pain of a changing home.)
They say home is where you hang your hat, but I think that's a load of crap for most of us. Home is where you line your nest with little bits of you, so that after your time out in the big, bad world you have somewhere safe and secure to return to. I've never been one to be sentimental, so I think I underestimated the importance of home for most of my life. I took it for granted, and now it's gone, at least for the time being.
I'm living in a one-bedroom apartment that was originally supposed to be a shared space for Jessica and I to go to when it wasn't our week to take care of Hollis. It's decorated tastefully (if a little sparsely) and contains most of the accoutrements of daily life. I decided that our back-and-forth living arrangement didn't result in enough separation, and suggested I move into the apartment full time. Boy, I've got my separation now.
Despite moving a big chunk of my stuff from the house to the apartment, it still doesn't feel like home. Part of it is my lack of design skill, and part of it is a reluctance to fully settle into this place that I'll be leaving soon for something bigger. Whatever the reason, this place always falls short of "home." The walls are too white, the kitchen and fridge are too sparsely stocked, and I sleep on the couch every other week when Hollis stays here (he gets the only bed).
I spent this past week living out of a hotel for work, and I realized when I came "home" that this may as well be another hotel room. It smells nicer, and it has more of my stuff, but it's just about as comforting to my soul (and just about as familiar) as a room at my usual hotel in Bangalore. It's not a refuge from the big bad world; it's a constant reminder of it.
Part of the problem is that I'm a little embarrassed by my living arrangement. Someone asked me last night where I lived, and after describing the general area, she asked, "Oh, so which apartment complex?" I felt like such a cliche: middle-aged dad does something to end his marriage, and is forced to pack up and go live in a small apartment somewhere. It's a scene that has been played out over and over again in the world, and it attaches baggage to our Separation(tm) that shouldn't exist. I see it in the eyes of strangers that learn that I'm separated. I see it in the (admittedly very slight) awkwardness around the neighbors now when I go by the house to pick up Hollis. Jessica and I have worked really hard to make this transition amicable and respectful and egalitarian, but I definitely feel like strangers assign me the label of the guy who chose to leave his family and home for the promise of a better life somewhere else. (There's some implied jackassery in that label.)
The other aspect that hit me today, the more painful aspect, was the realization that I can't go back home again. The house is still a nest, but the little bits of me are mostly gone. I know it's painful for Jessica to live there without those little reminders of me, but it almost broke my heart today to realize I was slowly starting to feel like a stranger in my own house. The badass tempur-pedic bed that we were so excited to get doesn't have a "my side" anymore. I won't be walking by and feeling that little sense of pride about the slate my dad and I put up on the fireplace, or the pendant lamps over the bar that caused me to leave much of my blood sweat and tears in the attic. Sure, that stuff is all still there, but it's fading into the background of someone else's home.
I know this is temporary, and that Jessica and I are making the right decision. But man, what a shitty thing to have to go through. Can't I just skip all this and get to the other side already? The side where I have a place that's big enough to breathe in, with enough bits of myself to be able to come back in from the world and say, "Whew, it's good to be home"?
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