‘Wherever I lay my hat, that’s my home’

Close your eyes and say the word ‘home’. What comes to mind? Is it a picture or a feeling? The word itself has softness to it, don’t you think? You say the word and it almost hums on your lips. ‘Hommmmmmme’.

“Everyone goes home eventually” was a comment from a colleague when I told her that my daughter and I were moving to England after many years overseas. My 13-year-old daughter has never lived in England and I haven’t lived there for nearly 20 years, but when I tell people that we are going to England, they all say ‘Ah, you’re going home’ and smile. But are we? We are British with British passports and I grew up there, but we have no property in England, no family there so why ‘home’? Is home all about our roots, our childhood? Or is it simply a place that gives you a sense of belonging, a place full of memories and where ‘everyone knows your name’. Maybe it’s that connection with the past and to a period that shaped you and gave you wings. We’ve all felt ‘homesick’ at some point in our lives, but what is it we’re yearning for?

So I started to ask myself ‘What is home?’ And does home have to be singular? As expats, haven’t we built many homes over the years as we’ve travelled around the world? As temporary as the stay may be, don’t we unpack our bags, open the biscuits and relax with friends and neighbours? Isn’t it, therefore, a place where you feel calm and safe? Is it not ‘home’? I think Paul Young sang for all expats: ‘Wherever I lay my hat, that’s my home’.

Mark Cook, founder of the UK charity Hope and Homes for Children, believes every child should grow up in a loving home. Hope and Homes for Children works with orphaned or abandoned children in war-torn countries and takes them out of state run institutions and places them with families. Mark says: “When the children were asked what they really wanted their responses were unanimous: They all craved ‘a home.’” He continues: “By listening to the children we learnt it was within the security of a home and the love of a caring family that a child would truly flourish.” The charity links the words ‘hope’ with ‘home’ as if to say ‘once we have a home, we have hope’. I can’t help but think that it’s a word we take for granted.

Maybe ‘home’ is a feeling that a place gives you. A place where you can snuggle down to an evening of comfort and calm after a long day. A feeling of ‘hommmmmmmme’.

Maybe ‘home’ is where your family photos are on top of the tele, where coffee mugs are left in the sink, where clothes are thrown onto the chair in the corner of the bedroom, where the ‘Keep Calm and Carry On’ fridge magnets hold children’s party invitations in place.

A place where well-thumbed, oil splattered cookbooks are propped up against the stove (I have to share with you here that I am a terrible cook, but the books give a great impression of delightfully, well-prepared meals that are produced every night. Nothing wrong with creating an illusion now and again).

Maybe a home is where it’s OK to wear your pyjamas in the afternoon and watch endless repeats of Soaps, a place where you can sing off-key to your heart’s content while stirring lumpy porridge in the morning and where rooms are filled with belly laughs and stories.

Or maybe I have this all wrong. Yes, a soft pillow at night is deliciously welcoming and a kitchen full of smells of cooking breakfast is delightfully soothing (not from my kitchen I may add. I wonder if my daughter associates the smell of burning food with her idea of ‘home’?!!) But maybe home is far simpler. Maybe ‘home’ is simply being in the company of loved ones. Yes, to me ‘home’ is that warm feeling of complete security that fills your heart every time a loved one wraps their arms around you. It’s that sense of familiar, belonging and complete, utter love that never fades, never changes ... wherever you are.

Dedicated to my daughter, Phoebe and my parents. You are my ‘home’.

Charlotte K. Arrowsmith is an English language lecturer at the UAE University, Al Ain.