1.What does home mean to you?I think "home" means different things to different people.
Before I came to New Zealand,I lived with my father and my mother.Home was a safe,comfortable,quiet place to me.When I finished work,I went home and my mother would have prepared the dinner for us already,we enjoyed a delicious meal and talked about the day's happening.During these moments,I felt so happy when we were together.
Two years ago,I immigrated to New Zealand with my husband.Since then,the "home" has taken on a new meaning to me.Beacuse we needed to build up a new "home" for ourselves.When my husband comes home after work,he can enjoy a healthy meal that I cook.My husband likes dessert after a meal too,so sometimes I will make some cakes and Quiche.We like to have a quiet lifestyle,and we are enjoying ourselves now,maybe this is the concept for me (us) of "home".
I think "home" has a different definition for each person.I am enjoying everything of my home now.We hope to move to a big house later,but I think the most important thing is who stays with you and who can give you a free,warm,comfortable place.
2.Home is where the heart is.A beautiful mansion,castle or the best built house does not make it a home.Home is where you live,often with the people you love.It is a refuge from the world.It is where you store your possessions.
Possessions define who we are.In one home might be the picture great Uncle Lawrence painted,and in another might be the mounted 6 point elk head the owner shot on a hunting trip.Some homes might display hundreds of photos of family members,while others have large collections of books or jazz records.These are the things that make a house a home.
To me,home means family,love and a personal space away from the rest of the world.It is a place where the only rules are the ones you make.You can run around naked or scratch where it itches and not care what other people think.Home is place where you are always welcome,no matter what.
Home could be a crummy apartment in a bad neighborhood,or a huge mansion.It can be a cabin in the woods,or even a tent by a river.Home is where the heart is,be it ever so humble,there is no place like home.
3.For me,home is a place to call my very own,where I feel safe and sheltered at the end of a very long day.It's the place I run to when everything around me seems to be falling apart.
Home is a place where I can invite my friends and family for a quiet evening of dinner and a movie,or maybe a crazy night of boardgames where we laugh until our sides ache.At home,I get to be myself.I don't have to be a manager,a salesperson,or a clerk and the only problems I have to deal with are my very own.
To me,a house isn't just a house,even though I live alone.It's where I eat,sleep,breathe,and live.A part of me is forever embedded in every room.Every decoration and piece of furniture is a reflection of who I am and what I like.Almost every material treasure I own is somewhere inside my house.Over time,my current house has definitely become my home and I can't wait to get there at the end of each day.
My home is where I have total and complete freedom to do whatever I like without worrying what someone else will think.I have peace and quiet whenever I choose.Considering that I work in a very noisy environment where the public is constantly pulling and tugging at me for this or that,my peace at home is extremely important.If I want to sit quietly and read a book,then no one will tell me that I should be busy doing something else.If I want to spend the entire evening like a couch potato,then no one will care.
Home is a place for privacy.Only the people that I invite into my home have access to the place I cherish the most.I get to decide whether or not I trust a person enough to let them inside the place that is so much a part of who I am.My home is full of so many good memories of friends and family and all the good times we've shared.
There's an old saying,"Home is where the heart is".This is true on so many different levels.I love my home and I'm so thankful that I have it.I'm a very fortunate person to have a house that I can call a home.It doesn't matter that my home isn't the biggest or the fanciest,just so long as it's mine.
4.Can a house be a home?Or is it the people who are our home?Perhaps it is the climate and the culture that are home to some people.There are memories:sites and sounds and smells that make us feel at home.And there are spiritual homecomings that become wonderful cathartic moments for some.These experiences are all "home" in their own way.
I have fond memories of a house I grew up in.I lived there for 18 years with my mom and dad and three brothers.But that home now belongs to someone else.It seems foreign to me and strange when I stop a moment as I pass by on the street.The people I knew there are not there,and so it is empty to me.
Now I have lived with a wonderful gentle woman for 30 years.We've lived in about 20 different places including some that I can hardly remember.Each of them was our home when we lived there,but what made them home is that we were together there.We once bought a home together and lived there for 10 years.Yet that home was not our home because we owned it.Our home is where we are together.
There are some intangable things that tug at my heart and appear in my dreams.I recognize the things that still tie me to places in the past.Fresh fallen snow at night,the nuns from the college where I first lived away from home,the smell of lavender,and the taste of warm yeast rolls all bring me back to comfortable times that have nurtured me.
Countless times as a Christian minister I have seen people in tears come home to the community of believers.This spiritual homecoming often comes after stressful times of conflict.The ability to return to the faith of our youth is a powerful experience of home.
It must be like that with people who have been lonely for a long time.When they find a person who loves and nurtures them they must feel like they have come home to a place they have sought all their lives.
Home,then is a connection to people and experiences.Some people find it at grave sites,and some in old neighborhoods.There comes a time in life,as our bodies and mind begin to fail,when home is in our memories.Don't be impatient when your grandmother wants to tell you the same stories over again.She is just trying to share her home with you!