Summer has always been hard for me. I’ve never been too compatible with an absence of structure, and the option to be lazy becomes detrimental to my sanity much quicker than you — or I — would expect. I don’t mean to complain about having free time, trust me, that’s something I crave indescribably during the tiresome nine months of the school year, but when I do get time to myself, it’s never what I imagine. Or maybe I knew this would happen?
It starts out so digestible. I return home with all the physical constants of my everyday life: my weighted blanket, my favorite purses, my phone charger (shoutout to anyone still hanging onto the lightning cord, we are a dying breed), my three-and-a-half-year-old water bottle, and my stilettos. I am reunited with my family in their natural habitats. My siblings are on the last leg of the school year, while my mother keeps everything perfectly afloat — managing to clean the litter box daily — and my grandparents lead every crowd at any function; their applause is always the loudest. This is the only reason I came back.
Sometime after the kids’ last days of school fade into the debut of the latest season of Love Island, I am reminded of the mental constants: the guilt and grief (of what? I do not know yet), the untraceable rage of a 16-year-old girl, and a violent, insatiable hunger for something that exists with no name. I forgot that when my wish is granted, it is paradoxical. But didn’t this happen last summer? And the one before that? My mind refuses to grant me access to the past, but something tells me I’ve been here before.
By the time July’s heat can bake a dozen cookies on the dashboard, I believe I am a nomad. I sit in my room and my body feels safe, but my mind wanders. All my stuff can could should be moved out and replaced by my little sister’s furniture, a much more practical use of this space. She lives here year-round, after all, and I only come home to cry and complain about how I wish to be anywhere else. My mother tells me that I am worrying for nothing, my sister is happy with her current room. She sees me pick at my fingernails at the start of every sentence. I know she is only trying to ease my mind. We both know I do not belong here.
I pack my bags and travel to my dad’s, hoping a change of scenery will make me feel lighter. I visit, live out of a suitcase, play Roblox with my brother and sister, eat the food I’ve dreamt about, and watch TV on a ginormous screen. I have happy moments. I smile. I love being with my baby cousins; little children are good at keeping intrusive thoughts at bay. But I never forget that I do not have a home.
When the weight on my chest cannot be removed by my movement anymore, photos are (sometimes) a nice way to center myself. I look back at photographs from here in Boulder, beautiful moments captured of a Flatiron sunset or an instant of immaturity with my favorite coworkers. In some photos, I catch a glimpse of my smile. I cannot remember if it was artificial or authentic. I beg god to remind me what it feels like to be home. I cry to an empty sky and turn my prayers to my reflection. This is the period that I’d like to call resilience.
I assure myself I have been here before, and I lived to tell the tale. I hold the cats close to my heart and beg my brother to play Wii Sports Resort. He hardly agrees, but when he does, it is an occasion (I am the household bowling champion, but do not tell my mom I said that). I watch garbage TV with my sister and gawk at the turmoil of “Florida-Bama Shore.” Gamma and I get lunch and talk about the oldest lawyer in town, who resides just out of earshot. She knows everything about everything.
My eldest sister and I watch “Adventure Time” and change the profile photos on streaming sites. Our dad is Guy Fieri, my stepmom is Hedwig (Harry Potter’s pet owl), I am Issa Rae, President Barbie (duh), and she’s Marvin the Martian. We giggle through our brother’s alarmingly vulgar shrieks at his Xbox, followed by indistinct shouts to “knock it off.”
I swim in the pool and forget the weight of everything else when I rest on the bottom. Nothing compares to the satisfaction of lying on my mom’s bed, with both cats in the room, while we watch “Desperate Housewives”, and I scold her for scrolling on Instagram instead of watching. But everyone knows I cannot stay here forever.
Eventually, I do return to the glitz and glamour of Boulder. The cycle repeats. It is so easy, I forget why I ever left. The initial constants bring me comfort, but the mental grievances creep in and remind me of being unaddressed, with nowhere to call home, no location saved as default, no place to keep my prized Steve Madden diamond-studded stilettos. Can home even be a place in your 20s? Or is it only something to chase?
Until a month ago, I thought home existed in the arms of the person I called my lover. During this summer at home, there was nothing I craved more than his embrace. He looked at me like a woman, treated me like a person, instead of someone who either belonged to him or did not exist when he was not around. This was the closest I’ve felt to home in years.
I know, I know, I know. That is an unhealthy way to view a romantic relationship, but it was the first time I had ever felt understood by a partner. He saw me as a woman. Not the girl I dress as, or the student I am at a desk, or the young adult struggling to hold on to reality, but a woman who was alive. When I looked into his eyes, I saw the same unnamable pain I was born with. I told him I loved him. He said he loved me since the first day we met. Love had just grazed my fingertips before the rose-colored glasses were ripped from my pleading palms.
As it turns out, the entire relationship was a farce, and his arms held many. I now see the home I had in him was rooted in the love I gave.
My search has finally expanded inwards. I’m trying to understand that home can be my bare nails gripping the base of my royal blue nail polish while I struggle to contain the varnish on my toenail. I’ve kept a bottle of this exact ultramarine color since I was a little girl. I paint my toes like a toddler and scrub away the errors in the shower. This is home. I am my own home.
Home exists as I say it does. It’s never been specific coordinates on a map, but more of a sense of satisfaction. In two hours, I may bask in this fulfillment. In two weeks, I may decide I must live in Salt Lake City after I graduate. In two years, I may alter my career course in every possible respect. Maybe to be unaddressed is to be free. Must life always be a prison? Even if it must, I refuse to be its prisoner.
I know that right now, home is Gamma’s voice over the phone and reading a library book written by Toni Morrison. It sounds like my coworker’s heavy combat boots booming up the steep staircase. It smells like “Fall Night Long,” bought in bulk by my stepmom at Sam’s Club. It looks like the protruding part of the mountain, which we properly nicknamed ‘The Thumb.’ It tastes like any and every food doused in Louisiana Hot Sauce. It feels like tears rolling down my cheek, sometimes happily, sometimes not. Home lives within my spirit. As long as I have myself and my deviant trickster brain, I know I have a home.