Home is where the cat is.

I was in the Phoenix airport the other day, flying back home after having been...home? (We'll get to that hesitation in a minute.) when a woman commented on my Ohio State bag (yes, I'm THAT kind of fan). Her daughter was attending the school and the woman was flying back to Orange County after visiting said daughter. I said I, too, was flying back to the OC after being home for a few days. Cue the conversation...

"But you live in Orange County now, right?" she asked with raised brow.
"Yes. My husband is in the Marines and we've been stationed there for a little over a year now."
(At the mention of "Marines", people nearby turned and started listening. It's amazing how fascinated most people are of the military and the lifestyle.)
"But you don't live in Ohio. Why would you still call that home?!" She actually sounded a little shocked.
"Well. Um. I guess because that's where I grew up. Since my husband's in the military, we'll probably be living in a lot of different places and have several homes and..." and then I sort of stopped talking.

Because, dear readers, that's when it hit me. I don't know what (or where!) home is anymore. Is it the place we own in Washington DC? Even though I only lived there for two months and we currently have another family renting it? Is it this apartment in the OC where we've lived for a year, but I'll be living in by myself for another year? Or is home where I grew up, where my parents still live and my brother and sister and their families visit on a weekly basis? I don't feel a connection to the home in DC or the home here. It's just where I've got some stuff I can call 'mine'. And I know, "home is where the heart is" so home is...Afghanistan? That doesn't work. "Home is where your stuff is." Well, sure, I suppose, but that hardly seems sentimental. "Home is the place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in". My parents, who have taken all of their children in at some point, would wholeheartedly agree with Robert Frost on that one. The old Amish church that my parents made into a home is still my home. Right now, this lovely apartment in lovely SoCal just feels like "the place I live". So maybe 'home' is more of an emotional feeling? The place you can go to anytime and be with the people you love and feel like you belong. It's not easy being a Single Wife (sallyannemcbride trademark). It's not easy trying to make a home with the man you love, when the man you love, is living in a tent in a war zone. (Oh, I ain't living there, people.) Instead, I'm attempting to make a home with my cat. And, for now, that'll just have to do.