An Argument for Vagrancy, an Argument for Home

Back when I was a sophomore or a junior in high school some friends of a friend did something completely unexpected-- they ran away to the East Coast. They dropped out of high school, bought some Greyhound bus tickets, and vowed to never live by anyone else's rules again.

At that moment, when they left everyone and everything behind, I bet they must have felt pretty empowered. I think I would too. Simplicity is a beautiful thing.

But what happens when simplicity becomes more complicated than one originally expected? What happens when you realize you have traded away your old set of problems for a new set? Do you sojourn on? Or do you return home?

vagrancy |ˈvāgrənsē||
noun
1 without a settled home or regular work; wandering from place to place and living by begging

home |hōm|
noun
1 the place where one lives permanently, especially as a member of a family or household

Lately, I've been thinking quite a bit about home. When I think about home in a traditional sense, I remember the seven days I have collectively spent in Tucson during the past six months. When I think about home in an untraditional sense, I think about myself.

I've always been a traveler, but now I think I've crossed the line into vagrancy. I don't, as some vagrants are known to do, live by begging for food, but I do have a habit of wandering from place to place.

Living out of a suitcase or a box or what have you is, as I've learned, kind of stressful. It's hard to settle into a place impermanently. Even as I sit here typing in my dorm room I am thinking about how soon enough I will have to move all of my stuff out of here, and back into the boxes and suitcases from where it all came.

My books, my clothes, my hair even, are scattered all over the place-- all over my room, my friends' rooms, my room in Tucson. It's hard not to be scatter-brained when everything else seemingly is.

I've come to realize that home has little to do with where your belongings are, or even where you sleep or eat or poop. Home is a fleeting feeling; it's warm and calming, and comes from within. Like Mary Poppins, I carry around an enormous bag filled with everything I could ever possibly need. Unlike Mary Poppins, however, the bag is inside of me.

Like my friend's friends who ran away to the East Coast, I have decided I don't need anything to be at home. I just need myself.

That doesn't mean I'm home all the time, but it does mean that maybe someday I will be. Being comfortable is not an easy thing to do, and sometimes my brain looks like my floor-- covered in stuff. Having the strength to clean up inside your head and sever all of the negative thought loops and stress patterns is really hard, but is necessary in finding home.

Sometimes, if we're lucky, our home coincides with the location where all of our toiletries and other worldly possessions are kept. Other times, though, home is only a feeling. Sit down, find your breath, and remember that you are all you've got 24/7/365.

The inner-- what is it?
if not intensified sky,
hurled through with birds and deep
with the winds of homecoming.

-by Rainer Maria Rilke