You can’t really go home again. That’s the line, isn’t it? And it’s true, mostly. The people shift. The light hits differently. The street names are the same, but the feeling in your chest isn’t. Still, I try. I walk the old routes. I peek into old routines. I drive slowly past houses that used to matter. And sometimes, I catch a flash. A scent. A sound. A face I used to know. And for half a second, it feels like no time has passed at all.
But then the moment fades. Always. The faces blur. The light changes. The old house has new blinds, and someone else’s shoes are by the front door. The truth lands: home isn’t where I was. It’s the version of me that lived there.
That version, by the way, feels very far away. The girl who swore she’d leave and never look back. The one who swore the city would be her salvation. The young mother with babies on her hip and a mind full of lists. The woman with just enough money to buy the house and just enough panic to keep her up at night wondering if she’d made a terrible mistake.
Still, she built something. A feeling. A rhythm. A home.
Creating that feeling has become something of a quiet obsession. Especially now. My boys are at university. One is in a new city. One is in a far away city that has captured his heart, building a life, collecting experiences I’ll never fully know about. They are stretching away from me. As they should. That’s the job.
But I have never felt more deeply the importance of home. Not just the house itself, although I do care deeply about that. I light candles before they arrive. I fluff pillows. I buy their favourite snacks. I clean in a way that says, I want you to feel at ease. But it’s more than that.
It’s the air. The feeling when they walk through the door. The sense that this is a place where they don’t have to perform or explain or achieve. This is the soft landing. The refuelling station. The place where they are loved so thoroughly, so relentlessly, that the world can’t quite shake it from them.
I’ve come to see that I’m building it just as much for me as for them. Maybe more.
Because I never had that. Not really. Not in the way I wanted. There was always a little too much chaos. Too much unpredictability. Too many people. Too much movement. So many people. I didn’t grow up knowing, in my bones, that I could return and be caught. And so now, I create it. Obsessively. Soft towels. Warm soup. Lights on. Voices that say, "Come in. Sit down. Take your time."
I’m not pretending it’s perfect. Sometimes the fridge is empty. Sometimes I’m distracted. But they know. I think they know. That this place is theirs. That it was made for them. That no matter how far they go, someone is always watching the clock a little when they’re expected home.
There’s something else, too. A small grief in knowing that the original version of home—the one where their shoes were always in the hallway and their backpacks were always slouched by the door—is gone. That chapter is over. I didn’t see the last page when it turned. I just looked up one day and the house was quieter.
But that version of home had its moment. And this new version? This version is quieter but somehow deeper. Less about control and more about care. Less about creating a perfect family life and more about holding space for whatever comes next.
When I walk through the house now, I sometimes imagine what they’ll remember. The worn kitchen table. The Sunday morning pancakes. The smell of laundry. The fact that we argued, yes, but also that we laughed. A lot.
Home isn’t a single place or even a single time. It’s a feeling. A set of memories. A safety net that follows you, even when you don’t realise it. And for me, it’s the most important thing I’ve ever made.
So I keep walking the old streets. Not to recapture anything, but to remember. To honour the selves I’ve been. And to remind myself that home isn’t just the place that made me. It’s the one I’ve built. The one I’m still building. And it’s waiting, lights on, whenever my boys come back through the door.