on the way home
i wrote this while in transit on my way home the other day. i know it's from a while ago, but i still thought it was worth posting.
--
in chinese, the verb you use when going home is "to return", not "to go". this isn't particularly fascinating, but i've always found it kind of interesting how that differs from english. additionally, the chinese word for "home" (家, a pig under a roof) means home as well as family; it's sort of an all encompassing word for that place you go to rest and feel, as we would say, at home.
so here i am in china in a somewhat particular situation. while in china, my family is all over the place (mostly in chicago), but my house is in hangzhou. and it's difficult to say i'm "returning home" because i'm leaving that other half of "home" (family) to come back here.
i had such an incredible time seeing my family -- the first time in a year and a half that all of us have been in the same time zone! -- and it broke my heart to say farewell, especially because the week i had was far from enough. but like i said, we're all over the place now. it's hard to say, for me, where my family calls home: Will has been in scotland for a year and a half, maggie33 has been in korea for ages, and nellie has been in california for as long as i can remember. and i haven't lived at 914 (our home in chicago) for six years. (not to mention the fact that my friends are so spread out that the largest number in one city is two or three)
because of that, these last few weeks have been strange for me. up to the middle of december, i couldn't wait to go home to chicago. but now, about a week (and an eternity on a plane) after i've left, i feel like i'm returning home.
while i already miss my family like hell, i can't explain to you how excited i am to return to that other half of the word (the half of the word that doesn't include my family). i can't wait to give my girlfriend a hug, to set up my drobo and sync my apple tv, to have everything on a wireless network again, to not worry about whether everything will fit into my suitcase, to not worry about my stuff when i leave to go buy an egg pancake (oh! and those pancakes!).
so, i woke up this morning at 5am, not quite adjusted to this hemisphere's timezone, singing a weird peter's-head remix of neil's "on the way home" and the beatles' "two of us" (...on our way home).
i've had such a wonderful trip, was able to see a bunch of you, but i'm thrilled to return home again.
comments: