My sister, Veronica, spent many years living in California. Mostly it was Santa Cruz, but she lived in Arcata while she was working on her undergraduate degree. Last year she relocated to North Carolina to go to graduate school. That’s still quite a ways away from us, here in New England, but she is living in Massachusetts for the summer. This is a rare treat; we don’t usually get to see her very often.

A few weeks ago, she came to dinner at our house. After I’d put Nate to bed, we got to have a real, grown-up conversation. She observed how strange it is that the town where we grew up no longer feels like home to either of us. We agreed that it can take years before a place starts to feel like home. She’ll be going back to North Carolina soon, but her heart is in Santa Cruz.

Veronica asked me where I considered my home to be. I had to stop and think about it.

When Sarah and I started planning a family of our own, we knew we couldn’t stay in Salem. It was a fun place to live, but it did have a few drawbacks. I never felt terribly safe living there. It’s at least half an hour’s drive to get to a major highway, and Sarah told me that the public schools were a nightmare. Sarah was living in Brookline when I met her; we loved it, but no way could we afford to buy there. So we drew circles on the map around her parents’ house, my dad’s house, and her sister’s house. I sat down with the Commuter Rail schedule, and she sat down with the public school rankings and per-student expenditures tables. We arrived independently at the same suburban town. I can’t recommend house-hunting with someone who is eight months pregnant, but it didn’t take us long to find the perfect house. We moved into our new home a little less than a month before Nate was born.

Sarah was the one who was putting down roots here. She joined the Mom’s Club, and took Nate out exploring every day. They went to the library, they found all the playgrounds and parks, they took Baby Yoga together. Now that she’s gone, Nate goes to day care, and I spend most of my waking hours at work. I have made a few close friends in town, but I can’t say with any degree of conviction that this is where I was meant to be.

Don’t get me wrong: I have no intention of moving. This is Nate’s home, if nothing else, and I want to give him as much stability as I possibly can. I do like living here, and I know it will seem like home to me soon enough.

But the question remains. If money were no object… if Nate were grown and living on his own… where would I want to be? Where do I belong?

There are a number of places where I can remember feeling at peace, but they’re not home.

Home is wherever Sarah is.