No Surprises Here

What’s a place you visited that felt like home?

The place that should feel like home, a place where you feel strong, safe, and content, should be something you take everywhere and never leave behind.

We can all have buildings to live in, the lucky ones that is, we can all have places we love, but life might move you away. My family has a pattern of being moved away from where we love and never getting home again.

My happy years were the first 6, then we left our dilapidated old house in a poor but friendly and caring area, and we moved to a fancy house (for us) where front doors slammed. We did have lovely neighbours but goodness knows who lived 20 houses away. It was a long road full of small villages.

I hated it, mum hated it, we tolerated it.

Then I made the mistake of marrying, my ex already had a house, I had to live in it. Bit bigger, even posher, I quite liked it but it wasn’t home.

Life moved me on to Wiltshire. Lovely little house, nice people. Not home. Then Somerset, surprisingly big house for the money, very lonely when you were alone a lot. I loved it, but not home. Made a couple of friends.

Now I’m in the West Midlands UK. Lovely neighbours, my Frister came with us thank God, no other real friends. Not home but extremely nice, house okay.

This is how I discovered where home is.

I Am

I am my home, I am my everything. I am the choices I make about the way I feel.

I am my safety, my security, and my greatest love. I’ll bet that last one sounds a bit self-oriented? Not at all, that’s what taught me to respect others.

Ooh I am loveable and important! Wow! So then are all these people I come across. I must tell them!

You might think Tony ought to be that? He is, but he can’t make me feel at home, safe. I have to do that. I have to accept the support he offers as something I deserve. Then, of course, I have to deliver that too.

All strong relationships help you to create that safe feeling of being centred in yourself. A safe space that no one and nothing can touch. Then you have everything a home delivers:

Safety

Security

Shelter from the world

If you don’t love you, you won’t trust others, then you may rely on places and buildings. I feel so at home in Rome and Paris, but I can’t live there, partly because of the odious Brexit, partly because taking the cats abroad would put them through hell.

So I don’t need to spend my life wishing I were there, or dreaming of a home that’s long raised to the ground, or an area we couldn’t afford to move back to.

What a waste.

That’s my twist on an old question. Wish it was a more lively one but little bro is causing concern. Off to see him, prayers if you can spare any for him please. 💖

Best love

Amorah – Deb

Prayers for you and yours too, with love.