There's No Place Like "Home"

Having just returned from a 3 month journey to Guatemala where I blogged about my experiences on www.marybethvolunteers.blogspot.com, I am curiously pushing the limits of my idea of "home."  Yes, there are sayings such as "home is where is the heart is" and Dorothy's famous one-liner: "there's no place like home," but when I think about the family and friends that I now have all over the world, and the culture and wonder yet to be experienced in my curvy-life-path, I cannot help but imagine home as something completely opposite than the tiny comfort of the four walls in which I was raised.  Here is my observation on "home":

Home is when you are in a foreign culture full of wonder and open to interpretation. There is always a sense of mild discomfort in not knowing what lies ahead in your next adventure. My home is the world. Here I am always on the cusp of a new realization or revelation and am given the fortune of a new perspective from every member of humankind. That’s where the heart of home lies…in the world…and in humankind. My family is humankind; those whom I encounter. I look like them. We stand up straight and have legs and arms, fingers, teeth, and hair. We are all shades of brown. We have the same basic needs, and at our core, we express sadness and joy in some way. We lament, desire, feel pain, desperation, hunger, fear, and wonder. These are my family members. Our neighborhoods are large and look quite different, but I would be thrilled to spend a day of my life in each house of each of my family members of the world just to know them…I mean, really know them. Home is not a house. Home is not one location, one group, one nuclear unit, one idea, one place of safety. Embrace culture. Embrace humanity. Embrace our world. Embrace your home.