English Composition: Reading Response

Home?

The question of what home means to me has been one that I have been trying to answer my whole life. I remember when I first moved here that when I was really upset I would always say that I wanted to go home and my mother would tell me that this was my home now. That answer was never acceptable to me and I would always reply that “home is where the heart is” and my heart isn’t here. Just saying that I wanted to go home was comforting as a child and I never had a doubt that my home was in Chicago. That is until my mom came back at me with a question after I told her home wasn’t here. “Well Tracy, if home isn’t here where is it?” The words hit me like a cold wave of water. I don’t know where my home is.

Ever since that moment I have been on a never ending search for my home. I soon realized that looking for home is harder than I thought. What makes it so hard is that I don’t know what home means to me. So, I guess I’ll continue my life with the constant feeling that something is missing until I stubble upon “home” than I’ll know what home is to me. Sounds like an awful way to live, but how else will I find it? Process of elimination seems to be the only answer to this riddle. Try on everything until I find the perfect match, like prince charming trying to find Cinderella with only her shoe. Too bad I’m not Dorothy, than I could just click my heels together saying “there’s no place like home” and find myself there. What if home is just found in fairy tales? I could look forever without much success.

I believe home is out there somewhere just waiting for me to find it. That is how fairy tales work isn’t it, believing? How will I know when I find home though? I guess I’ll just feel it and know. Or I could just follow the quote I’ve been carrying in my wallet since I coped it onto an old receipt from a gas station August 26, 2003 (date on receipt). “Wherever the snail goes, there also goes the shell.”