How do we define “Home”?

Is home where you're from, or is it the place that provides space for you to be your truest self? Is it even a place? Does it exist sincerely in the moments between moments? Woven into the fabric of your being so intricately that it challenges your ability to pinpoint one spot on a map when you’re asked.

Can it be named, or can it only truly be felt? For me, it is Alaska, I believe. Not because it’s where the majority of my existence has taken place, or because I can visualize the roads as I trace them. It’s Alaska because it is here, in both physical and emotional forms, that I have found myself. Through which I have found those who share with me the joys and pains and chaos of this existence, and through which they have found me. Its grandness reaches far beyond the expansive mountain ranges and endless streams. Its grandness reaches deep within those who invite it in and knocks firmly on the door of those not yet ready or able to accept it. I have accepted it, and with that acceptance, it has accepted me.

This community, this place, these moments exist with me and I with them. It is this home that offers wide-open space to run through and, at the same time, intimate moments to look inward.

Will Alaska continue to be “home” when I leave, if I leave? At the present moment, I’m inclined to say yes. Perhaps because its familiarity is comforting, tangible. A welcoming embrace. Like getting off the airplane and seeing your friend there to greet you. But perhaps “home” exists as a giant tarp under which all the lived experiences, connections, and values that have collided to shape me are held.

I’m also inclined to believe that Alaska, as a place, a concept, an energy, is unique in the context of “home”. I humbly recognize my bias in that inclination and furiously cast aside that humbleness when the reel of memories made and witnessed here flashes in my head. I believe Alaska deserves it, and it demands it.

I’ve met many people who have found themselves in Alaska. People who traveled from afar, running from, searching for, or happening upon an existence. For them, home may still be the place they came from, and Alaska exists to hold them steadily until they’re ready to return there.

Maybe that’s how we define it. An existence that holds you, if not forever, for now. For as long as you’re willing to allow it. Sharing your values, knowledge, and presence with a force that asks nothing of you but to be.