On Homesickness
It’s a beautiful spring day in Boston. Finally! Finally? Everywhere I’ve lived, the air feels different and the seasons emerge differently, yet except for North Carolina — where we lived for five years — spring has never been an “early” season. So I don’t know why it continually surprises me when it shows itself so “late.”
My freshman year of college, my friend Bree and I had an amazing opportunity to travel to London for spring break — which was probably mid- to late-March. And in my mind, I was like, “Spring break? Spring means temperate climate and spring break is when a lot of people go to the beach, so I probably only need to bring this very thin jean jacket that is really more like a shirt.” What was I thinking? All I can say is that even though I grew up in rainy Seattle, it never really gets that cold there, so I guess what I was thinking was: This makes total sense. (But hello, no umbrella?)
Bits and pieces of “home” build upon us, layer after layer after layer. And if you move around a lot, you start to lose a sense of what’s normal/expected/typical. (This last move = TELL ME ABOUT IT.) This book — On Homesickness by Jesse Donaldson — is so unique. Unique in its format — blips of poetic prose, blips of memoir, blips of history. And unique in the same way that every locale, every “home” is unique. What I see is likely not what you see, and what I feel is certainly not what you feel.
“Spring” doesn’t leave any location behind, but let’s remember that it’s different everywhere.
originally published on instagram