You Will Never Be Completely At Home Again

Some things I've learned about how to create a life

I live in Seattle now.

It’s the second official day of summer, and I awake to the tapping of drizzle, fog weaving around neighborhood conifer trees, and a cool breeze sifting through window screens. I pull on a wool sweater and socks, start up the coffeemaker, and take a seat overlooking a hilly part of town.

The overcast morning brings back memories of my first summer in San Francisco in 2014, when I moved without knowing about “Karl,” the fog that persistently cloaks SF in summertime. I lived in a teeny basement apartment with my cat and, much to my surprise, had to run the space heater all season to soothe my bones that ached with cold. Mark Twain once said, “The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco.” Word. I grew to love it. I would drive out of the city to play in the sunshine and heat, peeling off layers of wool (still a big wool gal over here) only to return to my corner of Outer Richmond and put them all back on, light candles, and fall asleep under a mountain of quilts.

I’ve been thinking a lot about my time in SF leading up to this move. It was a dreamy period, but it was also a hard one. I arrived in SF without knowing a soul, not even really knowing myself, on the heels of a much-too-young divorce and leaving my religious community. I spent many solitary hours riding my bike around the hills, exploring parks and beaches and cheap burrito spots, working from home as an editor for a narcissistic self-help guru, often lonely and a little lost… and slowly sank into depression. (This was also before I figured out how to treat my PMDD.) Despite the mental health challenges, I loved it there, but I didn’t give myself long enough to settle. I left after a year for another adventure and fleeting attempt at finding “home.”

Flash forward to 2025, I have braced myself for this transition with the foresight of an extra decade under my belt. I knew what I didn’t want to do — self-isolate, be a hermit, rely on cheap dopamine hits — and I also knew what I did want. In Boulder, for the first time, I created a life. Even if the place didn’t feel exactly like “home” — I struggled with the unendingly bluebird skies, arid landscape, and the culture — I put in the time and work to make it home. I found a 265-square-foot, terribly insulated cottage and dressed it up with candles, thrifted rugs, and wonky handmade pottery. Friend groups graciously adopted me. My art practice evolved and eventually flourished in an artists community I miss dearly.

Why give that up?

It’s a funny thing when our souls call us to do something that rocks our evolutionary animal bodies to the core. Boulder was safe. I had shelter I could afford. I felt I belonged. But then this opportunity presented itself — I could go on a new adventure with someone I loved, try on a new place, be in a new environment, grow. And as sad and scared as I was, my little heart lit up at the chance to return to the coast, where I’ve always felt alive.

Homecoming

In 2016, I traveled around North America in a Toyota Previa minivan, starting in Florida, booking it up to Maine, and then out to the west coast, where I spent the majority of my time in the PNW and British Columbia. I had just finished the sweltering slog across the middle of the country, sleeping in Cabela’s parking lots under fluorescent lights atop steaming cement, and finally made it to the one thing I wanted to see, touch, taste, feel most — the Pacific. I pulled into an empty lot with a brown sign reading “Beach Access,” and followed the arrow through a portal of shore pine and Kinnikinnick that opened up to one of the most rugged stretches of coast I’ve ever seen. A voice in my chest boomed, “You are home.”

Actual photo from this day — July 1, 2016

I felt something similar last month when my guy and I descended from the mountains into Seattle on a glistening summer evening. The sun was still high at 7pm, and we drove over a bridge into the city with water in every direction, dappling in the light, green growing over underpasses and bridges, and my heart swelled. “We live here!!!” we exclaimed. My gaze swiveled side to side like a pendulum as I took it all in and, of course, cried a few (small) tears (of joy).

I’ve lived long enough to know that thinking in all or nothings is foolish. Does something in this part of the world light me up in a way that nowhere else does? Yes. Did a Vedic astrologer once tell me, unprovoked, that I will always be drawn “north and west”? Yes. Do I miss my friends and family in Colorado more than anything? Yes. Is this the place for me, my forever home? *Shrugs*

I don’t know if I will find the same feeling of “home” and community here that I did in Boulder. But I also feel like Tamaqua, Pennsylvania, is home. And San Francisco. And Wellington. And the little farm I took care of for a summer in Santa Fe. They all feel different, and they’re all home. And I have the suspicion that one day this will be home, too.

I’ll sign off with a quote I think of often, from Miriam Adeney.

You will never be completely at home again, because part of your heart always will be elsewhere. That is the price you pay for the richness of loving and knowing people in more than one place.

PS: I have so many more thoughts and questions on home, belonging, and place… leaving with this quote doesn’t feel like a bookend, but an opening to a whole new topic I want to dive into.