I want to go home. I want to a place where I belong.  I’m tired of being stuck in a place where I don’t belong. I’m tired of pushing against the currents of normalcy. I’m tired of lagging behind in just about everything (or so it feels). I’m tired of not knowing…about anything.

But I am lost.  I turn around to face nothing but shadows and silence.  Except for breaths – my own breaths, the only indication that tells me that I’m still alive.  Well, or at least I think I am. I look around to find nothing.  Where is home?  What is home anyway?  Did it ever exist?  Did it once exist but slowly disappeared?

Logically, of course, I have a home (not that I’m remotely close to living on my own).  But can any safe, quiet place with a computer (and maybe a bed) be my home as long as its familiar? Do I even really have a home? A place where I feel like I belong? A place to settle, to be “the place” of what I am to be?

No.  I don’t. I’m homeless in that way, a wanderer seeking a place to stay.  Searching for a place to call home.  To settle down and belong. But maybe I don’t need a home.  Maybe I want to be continuously moving, continuously exploring but most of all, continuously learning (and analyzing apparently).  So maybe I’m often stumbling but I know how to stay on my feet, know how to carry on. I don’t settle down. I am a restless dreamer, a restless wander. I don’t stay in one place for too long. A wanderer that can both loves movement yet somehow hates change (which is a sort of movement, I suppose). I’m not the type to stay in line and wait around. I don’t have that type of patience.

The feeling of belonging just isn’t there.  I’m in this place but I know right now, where I am isn’t quite where I want to be. Although I don’t quite know where I want to be in the first place. But it isn’t here. I wander the sidewalks, deep in thought. Lost in thought. But not quietly…which I suppose, creeps people out especially when you add dashing to the mix.  But that’s okay (well, okay… maybe it’s not but screw social norms!) because for that moment I am not in their reality. I am in mine. In my head. This is my place, this is where I could be anything I want, I could do anything I want. But I cannot stop the glares that come my direction, other than to try to run away from it. I can still feel the weighted, awkward silence that lingers in the air when someone asks me “are you lost” or “are you okay”.

I look around, trying to put names on the paths that stretch endlessly ahead. But they have no names either. No names to indicate where they go or how far they go on. No names to show the playfulness of the namer or think about its allusions. No points of reference.  Here, we are all anonymous, yet deeply personal at the same time. We? Yes. We. Me, my thoughts, my shadows and the paths that wind to who-knows-where. And of course the silence, the solitude that envelopes us all.  So yes,”us”.  “Us” – it sounds so personable doesn’t it? Friendly, even. Maybe even romantic in some contexts. But “us” its just solitude, shadows and silence. You didn’t think solitude would be so crowded did you? I hang out in solitude, not in a vacuum. Those are two different things. Alone, at night is solitude. Floating around in some sort of atom smasher may be more in the realm of a vacuum. More or less. Okay, so there’s the odd particle or energy wave or whatever along those lines to keep you company in your dimension. As if you’re going to have have deep conversation with a nano-particle or dark energy  or whatever geeky thing you have there anyway (though that might be very interesting).

I continue on. Wandering. Still seeking a home. Still seeking a place to be belong, a place for comfort and a place to stay and settle. A place where everything is less alien. I’m not sure if I need it or want it but it’ll be a nice novelty for a while at least.

What is this place anyway? Who are these creatures? Why do they waste so much time talking about nothing interesting or important, like the weather. And not something interesting about the weather like how it was historically or what it may be in the future or why is the weather is the way it is or anything like that. But how the weather feels like even though you were all likely experiencing the same weather anyway. Oh come on. Why are their piercing gazes directed towards me? And how is asking “how are you” considered “nice” when no one really cares anyway and just mumble “fine”? Why do they need greetings when it’s pretty self-evident that the person is there, talking to you? It’s not like greeting the person suddenly causes the person to exist (in this universe anyway). Why do these creatures engage in behaviour that would be threatening to all other species? I don’t know. I don’t understand. Well, I guess I do understand it logically but I can’t feel it. And what is love and why are so many people obsessed with it and think it’s the best thing ever? What is friendship and why does everyone like it so much? I wonder if I need to check my species here. I’m not sure if I’m the same ones as these.

Maybe I’ll never know these things because this isn’t home, no matter how much I may pretend it to be.

But even at home, everything is just as alien, otherworldly. As if I came plucked from some other reality or planet or just plan existence. The concept of home itself is a fabrication, just like those ruby slippers probably were. But only my shadows and thoughts are my constant companions, wandering with me. I really do wonder if my mothership would pick me up soon and whisk me to my home planet/existence. Of course, it probably won’t. I’m an alien from inner space after all.

So where’s home? Did it ever exist? Maybe not. I wander on. Still wondering. Still dreaming. Still searching. Alone. Solitude is not alien to me. It’s embrace is familiar, comforting. Warm and cool at the same time. Although sometimes it can get lonely I suppose. But that’s nothing new. I’m used to everyone around me making friends. I’m used to everyone around me do the things that people are supposed to do. I’m used to everyone around me growing while I stay the same. But I was always standing there, looking out the window, detached to the world where I don’t belong. I shake my head and walk on, not knowing where I’m walking to. But I know that I’m not home. I was never home. “Home” never existed even though the illusion of it did. But as I got older, the mask wore away as I watched the canyon between my world and the wider world grow. Its deep now. Wide too. I am careful not to go too close to the crumbling edges as I cling to the known.

Walk away. I’m used to that. It avoid things. Avoids possible situations I that I don’t know what to do with. If in doubt, walk away. It’s a simple solution. Walk away. Run if you must. Fly if you can. Swim if you want.

People-shaped beings move throughout, everywhere and almost all the time. But they’re just in the background. There is no interaction, as if they were just extras in my film with nothing to say or do but occupy space. They are just filler, living props. We’re from different dimensions. I can see everybody but cannot interact and never know what to say or what to do or when. Everyone is moving faster than me, on that different, faster and more social plane of existence. I don’t know. I kind of like my dimension. There’s a unique vantage point from here. The only trouble is that it doesn’t seem to mesh well with the rest of the world.

But where do I come from? Where do I belong? I don’t know. I look to the stars but they just shine on, just as they always had from where they came from so many light years away. I wonder what is beyond this universe, beyond this existence and if there are alternative realities, what are the other mes doing. What are they feeling? Do any of them belong or is that some sort of overarching theme to my existences? Of course, I will probably never know that but that’s okay. At least there are no shortages of wonders to ponder about. Alone of course, in solitude.

Maybe I’ll never find home and maybe one day that’ll be okay. Why settle down if you can continuously explore, continuously learn? And maybe one day I’ll find my place in the world. But for now, I am lost in life –  listless yet antsy. Still wandering, still searching for a place to belong even though I’m not even sure if I need to find it – or should.

*oh and I did take social geography that had a section on homes… but I’m not talking about homes in that sense.