Forever home

I love going home after being away for a period of time; I always get the feeling of belonging, comfort and a sense of contentment. It's one of the joys of going away, travelling abroad or away from home for any length of time - the homecoming.

It's a little bit the same when I go home to the small town I think of as my true home, where I was born; I feel in place when I do even though it has changed from when I lived there.

It's not a big place, even now, and most people know each other; there's gossip and people get involved with each other's business but that's a small town through and through I suppose and I'd rather that than have many thousands of people around I don't know and who don't care.

People say hello in the street, they have time to stop and talk and they help each other because they want to; it's something I don't find in the city where people seem so caught up in their own lives they don't seem to care about those around them.

In my home town people connect more, they invite each other for tea and scones, they speak with solidarity about small things like how congested the main street gets on the weekends when out-of-towners come to see the sights and they talk about how valuable those people are to the local economy in the same breath. They complain about the Christmas decorations the town put up each year but help put the very same ones up year after year and stand back clapping each other on the back at how good it looks and they always speak with happiness about living in the town.

There's a million little things that make small towns unique and it's all those little things that welcome me home when I'm able to return.

I'm not sure I'll ever live in my home town again but I'll visit often and have the same conversations at the general store, the post office, the fish and chip shop...which happens to be the very same shop for all three. It's going to be my home forever and no matter where I go that will never change.