Finding home

I've come to discover that living in a place doesn't necessarily make me feel like it's home. Sometimes for quite a while- three months in the current case. In fact, I've decided that the one thing that truly emphasizes the idea of home is leaving and flying into the local airport.  It's that feeling of, "I know this place. When I get to the end of this trip, I'll be in my bed, using my shower and cleaning up my space again." When I moved to Seattle, it probably took five or six trips into Sea-Tac before I could pick out landmarks flying in, mentally drive to my neighborhood and plan my next exploits of going to school, grabbing groceries or coffee and planning a night out with the girls. It's being able to visualize myself in a place that helps solidify its home-ness, and the airport is a key place for me to truly understanding where I live.

For the moment, flying into Seoul still seems totally bizarre- how can "home" be a place where I don't speak the language, where most of my friends don't live, I don't have a job and I can barely figure out how to buy laundry detergent on a good day? But somehow, each trip whether an hour away or around the entire world (see month of June... or imagine it as I didn't post then) helps the relief settle in just a bit more when I hear our talking front door welcome me home, even though I've yet to learn the phrase it uses.

As with most military families, I'm sure I'll learn to adjust more quickly the more moves we make. I can't imagine the upheaval that comes with moving 5, 6... 10+ times during a careers and how the families that don't strangle said career person dragging them from state to state or country to country.

So for now I'm going to settle in with a mug of tea and my coziest blanket for an episode of a crazy Korean drama and be happy I'm home.


Vocab of the day:
Korean: home = 가정 (gah-johng)
Military: HD = home defense