Home

It happens every year around this time. People I know (friends and acquaintances alike) tell me they're going "home" for the holiday.

Yes, I know I am a pain in the ass but honestly, people, you are GROWN UPS. You have families (and homes) of your own now. When does the home of your parents stop being "home"?

My home is wherever my husband and kids live. Period. Not where my parents live, not the town I grew up in, not the town of my grandparents or the town I graduated from high school in. Home is where I live, now, every day. When we lived in California, not once did I say we were going home on vacation. Why? Because, at the time, San Jose, California was home. My family lived there, my stuff was there, our life was there, it was home.

Possibly I make too much of this. But I don't think so. Home is where your life is; where your kids go to school, where your family goes to church, where your friends are. It is where you have a community that you have built with your own interests, your own beliefs. It is where you go to the library, where you go for a walk in the evening, where your kids learn to ride their bicycles, where you have play dates and sleepovers and play board games and watch TV. It is the neighborhood where your kids roller blade and scooter, where everyone knows you are the family with the pug (or the Cocker Spaniel or the tabby cat or the Basset Hound), where they want to see your Halloween costume each year, where they stop by for coffee and to tell you the new landscaping looks good.

This should not make you think that I am diminishing the importance of where one comes from. My hometown is a special place for me -- but it has not been home since 1988. I love my parents, I love the house I grew up in, I love that I can drive down every street in town and say, "I babysat at that house. That was where Jenni lived. The people at that house always gave out the best Halloween candy. That was Pine's house -- she was such a nice lady." I can't say that about any other town, and that is special. But it isn't home anymore.

Home is where my husband and kids are, even if it's a cardboard box. I'm just sayin'.