To The People I Call Home, Because Home Isn’t Just A Place

There is a difference between a house and a home.

A house is a place you live. A home is more than that: it’s a feeling, a sense of belonging, an overwhelming abundance of happiness. Home for me is any car ride with loud music and singing, it’s an Applebees’ romantic dinner for two, it’s swimming in the lake at my camp fully clothed on the last day, it’s some random person’s basement at 12:30 am, it’s fireworks on Fourth of July, it’s Italy, it’s the airport after not seeing my best friend for a month, it’s EVERYWHERE.

A place doesn’t make a home, people do.

In Oyster Bay, it is an actual requirement that you must live and breathe Billy Joel so naturally, his song “Youre My Home” inspired me to write this article; and as he says on track, “Home is just another word for you.”

The people I call home know exactly who they are.

They’re the people who make me consistently belly laugh, who are there for me because they wanna be. They’re the people I can go six months without talking to, yet not a thing has changed when we do. Nothing and no one can compare to the people that can make you feel content and comfortable with just their presence. They’re irreplaceable. They’re everything. But most importantly, they’re the people who remind me that I’m never alone. And thank you doesn’t begin to cover what I have to say to them. But I’ll try anyway.

Thank you for going on endless adventures with me no matter how far I drag you.

Thank you for sitting with me while I’m crying and look like Griphook from Harry Potter. Thank you for being my friend even though I like Harry Potter. Thank you for dealing with the fact that I’m half wise, old grandmother and half over-excited, petulant child. Thank you for letting me take all of your clothes. Thank you for always napping with me. Thank you for doing the cheesy things I like to do though you hate them.

Thank you for making me laugh and thank you for making me who I am.

But most importantly, thank you for teaching me that no matter where I am, no matter how I feel, it is who I’m with that makes each insignificant second a memory and makes life, as a whole, worth living. I am forever indebted to the people I call home for making me the single happiest girl in the world. Billy Joel said it the best “I’ll never be a stranger and I’ll never be alone, Whenever we’re together, that’s my home.”