I SO identify with this! I’ve lived here for 28 years, raising my family in the interior of “beautiful British Columbia”, and it’s not home. I truly get how gorgeous it is here, but all the magnificence has often been just one more thing I found overwhelming.
I’ve done much to ‘bloom where planted’, and have a better relationship with the land now, but I was born into the mystic landscape of lakes and rocks and windswept pines that is Northeastern Ontario, where the water welcomes.
In 28 years, I’ve been home 3 times. And the last two, while I still loved my favourite spots, didn’t feel the same. I have Facebook friends in the UK, and for years now the view from their windows or pictures of their morning walks take my breath away. I long for it as an ancestral home, perhaps? The home of my heart?
Iona certainly felt like home when I visited there!
A revelation that helped me carry on in the painful decades when my environment felt hostile is that my body is my home.
I am always at home, if I’m at home in my body. I never have to leave home, if my home is my body. I always belong, if my home is my body.
To me, this has been empowering.
(This opens a whole kettle of fish about the engineered antagonism women are expected to feel about themselves, but that’s for another day!)
I wonder if you’ve read The Shepherd’s Life by James Rebanks. I’m guessing you might have but if not I think you’d love it - a beautiful homage to Herdwick farming in the Lakes. Home is a funny one isn’t it. I’ve only lived in the South West for 3 years but already it feels much more like home than the South East where I was for 30 years. And then before that I was in North Yorkshire for just a handful of years but that still feels like my second home. It’s definitely a heart led feeling.
Oh wow. I didn't know that about Herdwick sheep. That's fascinating. I grew up in Devon by the sea and just like you I don't feel at home here in North Essex. The minute I hear a seagull I feel better again.
I know you weren't asking for sympathy, or worse still pity, but this makes me feel a little sad for you because my experience has been the complete opposite. We have lived in several parts of the country and have friends and family still linking us to those places, but where we are now is home even though I didn't move here until my 30s. I love it with a passion and you would have to drag me away now. I hope you manage to find a way to feel more grounded where you are, or if not find then find a solution that enables you to be somewhere that feels like home.
I do feel a bit guilty complaining, as we have had a really nice life in our adopted bit of the country. It's a nice place to live and somewhere that people actively choose to move to. It's just not 'us'.
It never used to bother me that much when I was younger and but I think increasingly we are both looking at life after children/work and thinking we would rather be living it elsewhere.
You didn't sound like you were complaining. You're doing the right thing thinking about it now - we've had similar discussions because we could go anywhere once retirement comes....but we've realised we don't want to, so we're spending the money we would have spent on moving on doing up the house (heating, kitchen etc) 😄
I miss the hills and the stone walls and the rain so much. I feel your sentiments, although my home is a little less north. I live in Hampshire and it’s beautiful, but I grew up in Warwickshire and we spent holidays and weekends in the Peak District and further north in Yorkshire and my heart still yearns for it so much. I’m heading up to visit my mum again soon and my heart is longing for the dales 💛✨
Thank you for building on this little idea I had about finding our 'home' and sharing your version of it with the readers. Also, such an interesting fact about Herdwick sheep. It makes me think that change can be off putting for us as humans as well, but there's truly no place like the one we're born into✨
Raised in the outskirts of a Scottish steel town, I felt completely out of place when I married and moved to Kent. Oddly enough, another steel town, but as I was busy commuting to London for university, I failed to see the similarities until recently. Despite 36yrs in the same house and raising 4 children, it still wasn't home - too flat for starters! Moved to the depths of Devon in July, nowhere near the sea that kept me sane during COVID and the time waiting to move, where we know no one but have family 15 mins up the road instead of 8hrs away. And yet, it's definitely already home.
Great reflections here! As someone who has moved around a lot for school/medical training, I’ve never lived anywhere longer than my childhood home. And it has been hard for me to think of anywhere else as home in terms of geography.
In the past few years, I’ve started to think of home in more existential/energetic terms as I consider the way being “home” feels: welcoming, safe, comfortable, loving, etc. It has helped me feel more at home where I live now, even if the surroundings are not what my body imagines to be home.
I find ‘home’ a very difficult concept. I’m 58 and I’m living in my 30th house. I was born abroad and lived there briefly (Africa) and I don’t ’fit’ anywhere. And we moved all through my childhood, and then I married an RAF guy and we moved even more. The most at home I feel is on the moors, in the wilderness, without people. But it’s nothing like Africa. I don’t feel at home there, I went back once. I’m not sure anywhere will ever be home.
After 6 years in Germany, I still feel like an outsider much of the time. It’s a strange mix of emotions to feel simultaneously homesick for California but to also choose not to be there.
I love your essay, and I resonate with a lot of it. I've lived in Lancashire for over twenty years but I still don't know that I really feel at home here. But then, when I visit the Midlands where I was born, I feel even more out-of-place there and feel like I only start breathing again once I pass Charnock Richard services on the M6!
That is so interesting about the Herdwick sheep. I was thrilled to purchase a Herdwick fleece directly from the farmer at an agricultural show, with no real idea what to do with it, just to have it and admire it. I'm sure I'll honour it with the right project one day...
Louise, your essay beautifully captures the deep-seated connection we have with the places of our past. It's like our own personal "hefting," isn't it? Your descriptions of the stone walls and expansive moorlands transported me right back to my own childhood haunts. I grew up in the city, but those rare trips to the mountains always felt like coming home in a way that the familiar streets never could. It's fascinating how these landscapes shape us, and how we carry them within us even when we're miles away.
Yes, I get this. I was brought up in Buckinghamshire. I lived in Staffordshire for 17 years, bringing up children, it never felt like home. Now living in North Lincolnshire, which is very much 'home' to me, I think it's because it's where my Grandma came from. The edge of a field, on a misty morning, blackberries in the hedge, climbing a style, that's home to me.
Oh my word. GORGEOUS Louise! I loved getting to know you better through this wonderful piece…also have to recommend Penny Wincer’s last podcast with Kerri Ni Dorchataigh…all levels of gorgeousness on this topic ❤️
It's so fickle. My heart sings when I hit the flatland fens. I'm definitely coming home (not least because it's where my parents are and where my brother is most remembered). Coming back to the North East, my home for 25 years, is never as joyful.
I SO identify with this! I’ve lived here for 28 years, raising my family in the interior of “beautiful British Columbia”, and it’s not home. I truly get how gorgeous it is here, but all the magnificence has often been just one more thing I found overwhelming.
I’ve done much to ‘bloom where planted’, and have a better relationship with the land now, but I was born into the mystic landscape of lakes and rocks and windswept pines that is Northeastern Ontario, where the water welcomes.
In 28 years, I’ve been home 3 times. And the last two, while I still loved my favourite spots, didn’t feel the same. I have Facebook friends in the UK, and for years now the view from their windows or pictures of their morning walks take my breath away. I long for it as an ancestral home, perhaps? The home of my heart?
Iona certainly felt like home when I visited there!
A revelation that helped me carry on in the painful decades when my environment felt hostile is that my body is my home.
I am always at home, if I’m at home in my body. I never have to leave home, if my home is my body. I always belong, if my home is my body.
To me, this has been empowering.
(This opens a whole kettle of fish about the engineered antagonism women are expected to feel about themselves, but that’s for another day!)
I wonder if you’ve read The Shepherd’s Life by James Rebanks. I’m guessing you might have but if not I think you’d love it - a beautiful homage to Herdwick farming in the Lakes. Home is a funny one isn’t it. I’ve only lived in the South West for 3 years but already it feels much more like home than the South East where I was for 30 years. And then before that I was in North Yorkshire for just a handful of years but that still feels like my second home. It’s definitely a heart led feeling.
Oh yes. Well actually my husband bought it and I keep meaning to read it. Thanks for the reminder
Oh wow. I didn't know that about Herdwick sheep. That's fascinating. I grew up in Devon by the sea and just like you I don't feel at home here in North Essex. The minute I hear a seagull I feel better again.
I sometimes feel guilty for not loving where I live more. It's a lovely place and there are far worse places to be, but it's just not home is it 🤣
I know you weren't asking for sympathy, or worse still pity, but this makes me feel a little sad for you because my experience has been the complete opposite. We have lived in several parts of the country and have friends and family still linking us to those places, but where we are now is home even though I didn't move here until my 30s. I love it with a passion and you would have to drag me away now. I hope you manage to find a way to feel more grounded where you are, or if not find then find a solution that enables you to be somewhere that feels like home.
I do feel a bit guilty complaining, as we have had a really nice life in our adopted bit of the country. It's a nice place to live and somewhere that people actively choose to move to. It's just not 'us'.
It never used to bother me that much when I was younger and but I think increasingly we are both looking at life after children/work and thinking we would rather be living it elsewhere.
You didn't sound like you were complaining. You're doing the right thing thinking about it now - we've had similar discussions because we could go anywhere once retirement comes....but we've realised we don't want to, so we're spending the money we would have spent on moving on doing up the house (heating, kitchen etc) 😄
My Mom was like that. She said she was a ‘transplanted prairie rose’.
Aww, that's such a nice way of thinking about it
I miss the hills and the stone walls and the rain so much. I feel your sentiments, although my home is a little less north. I live in Hampshire and it’s beautiful, but I grew up in Warwickshire and we spent holidays and weekends in the Peak District and further north in Yorkshire and my heart still yearns for it so much. I’m heading up to visit my mum again soon and my heart is longing for the dales 💛✨
Exactly that. It's just something that makes your heart sing isn't it
What a beautifully written piece Louise!💕
Thank you for building on this little idea I had about finding our 'home' and sharing your version of it with the readers. Also, such an interesting fact about Herdwick sheep. It makes me think that change can be off putting for us as humans as well, but there's truly no place like the one we're born into✨
Absolutely. And thanks so much for your writing inspiration ❤️
Raised in the outskirts of a Scottish steel town, I felt completely out of place when I married and moved to Kent. Oddly enough, another steel town, but as I was busy commuting to London for university, I failed to see the similarities until recently. Despite 36yrs in the same house and raising 4 children, it still wasn't home - too flat for starters! Moved to the depths of Devon in July, nowhere near the sea that kept me sane during COVID and the time waiting to move, where we know no one but have family 15 mins up the road instead of 8hrs away. And yet, it's definitely already home.
It's funny isn't it, the places that we settle and feel comfortable in. It's so personal
Yes, it can be so sudden - an instant of falling in love. And it goes beyond the human relationships. They come and go, but the land has you.
Great reflections here! As someone who has moved around a lot for school/medical training, I’ve never lived anywhere longer than my childhood home. And it has been hard for me to think of anywhere else as home in terms of geography.
In the past few years, I’ve started to think of home in more existential/energetic terms as I consider the way being “home” feels: welcoming, safe, comfortable, loving, etc. It has helped me feel more at home where I live now, even if the surroundings are not what my body imagines to be home.
That’s such a great way to look at it, thank you.
I find ‘home’ a very difficult concept. I’m 58 and I’m living in my 30th house. I was born abroad and lived there briefly (Africa) and I don’t ’fit’ anywhere. And we moved all through my childhood, and then I married an RAF guy and we moved even more. The most at home I feel is on the moors, in the wilderness, without people. But it’s nothing like Africa. I don’t feel at home there, I went back once. I’m not sure anywhere will ever be home.
Oh my goodness. That is a lot of movement
After 6 years in Germany, I still feel like an outsider much of the time. It’s a strange mix of emotions to feel simultaneously homesick for California but to also choose not to be there.
Hi Louise, new subscriber here :-)
I love your essay, and I resonate with a lot of it. I've lived in Lancashire for over twenty years but I still don't know that I really feel at home here. But then, when I visit the Midlands where I was born, I feel even more out-of-place there and feel like I only start breathing again once I pass Charnock Richard services on the M6!
That is so interesting about the Herdwick sheep. I was thrilled to purchase a Herdwick fleece directly from the farmer at an agricultural show, with no real idea what to do with it, just to have it and admire it. I'm sure I'll honour it with the right project one day...
Oh, how lovely to have a Herdwick fleece. I very nearly bought a wall hanging the other day with woven Herdy wool
Louise, your essay beautifully captures the deep-seated connection we have with the places of our past. It's like our own personal "hefting," isn't it? Your descriptions of the stone walls and expansive moorlands transported me right back to my own childhood haunts. I grew up in the city, but those rare trips to the mountains always felt like coming home in a way that the familiar streets never could. It's fascinating how these landscapes shape us, and how we carry them within us even when we're miles away.
Exactly this. We imprint on our landscape I think in the same way that animals imprint on others.
Yes, I get this. I was brought up in Buckinghamshire. I lived in Staffordshire for 17 years, bringing up children, it never felt like home. Now living in North Lincolnshire, which is very much 'home' to me, I think it's because it's where my Grandma came from. The edge of a field, on a misty morning, blackberries in the hedge, climbing a style, that's home to me.
This post really touched me, I’ve been living away from home for 5 years now, and I can only imagine what the next 20 will bring
Oh my word. GORGEOUS Louise! I loved getting to know you better through this wonderful piece…also have to recommend Penny Wincer’s last podcast with Kerri Ni Dorchataigh…all levels of gorgeousness on this topic ❤️
Oooh…thank you. I’ll definitely check that out.
It's so fickle. My heart sings when I hit the flatland fens. I'm definitely coming home (not least because it's where my parents are and where my brother is most remembered). Coming back to the North East, my home for 25 years, is never as joyful.
I often think of you as I head up and down the A1. I'm sure we must cross over sometimes 🤣