Three Years: Are we home yet?

Z and I just celebrated our third anniversary. Three years ago August we gathered almost all of our favorite people and made them stand around in 101 degree temperatures while we committed this and committed that. Then two months later, Zach and I packed my 101 pounds of craft materials into boxes and moved them up north to Portland.

And every time we drive down to the mid-valley I feel a twinge of homesickness. And every time we drive back over that Marquam I ask myself, "Does this feel like home yet?"

This is one of the questions I ask people who aren't from the area. How long did it take to feel like home?

During childhood, Albany was home. No questions. It's where everyone I knew lived. And when I was an exchange student, Albany was home because I knew Nitra was a temporary exchange student town. (And in some ways Albany became a heightened sense of home because in Nitra I was so terribly homesick.) And when I was in college, Albany was home because Eugene was the temporary college town. Even when I lived in Portland the first time, Albany still seemed like home because I kept thinking Portland would be a stop before LA or NY. Aaaand then I moved back to Albany.

So my experience for the first 28 years of my life has been consciously making the current location temporary because it isn't and can't be, the completely permanent idea of home.

How do we relocate the idea of home from the mythical place of our upbringing to the place we've planted our new IKEA bookshelves?

I'm not sure. And today we will drive back through those Albany fields and tomorrow we will cross back over that Marquam bridge and I will look at the skyline and wonder yet again.

Side noe:
I've realized recently that when I get homesick now it's the feeling I had for place but really it's for person. My homesick feeling often means I'm away from Zach. Which is sort of lovely I think.