There is no greater adventure than taking the first step into the real world. Graduating high school and making decisions that will change your life are the very first steps to becoming your own person. For most people, that means leaving home. It’s a scary situation, not knowing what lies ahead of you, if you’ll like it, or if in fact that the path you walk is the correct one for you. But the thought that keeps you sane is knowing that home will always be there when you want to come back.

After finishing my first semester of college and my longest time away from my small Alaskan town, home is one of the most comforting words to hear. The flashbacks of old summer memories, the smell of my favorite quilt, and the thought of eating a homecooked meal all come flooding into my mind when someone mentions the thought of home.

But what if I told you that this isn’t my home anymore?

When I began my adventure into my college years, I left home. Glennallen, Alaska, my hometown, will always be right where I left it. My house will always be in the same spot along the connecting highway. But little did I know that when I left, I buried my heart elsewhere. I will not find it in back of my mind with all my memories, not in the stitch of my quilt nor in the bottom of the pan of my favorite meal.

If you’d asked me what home meant about a month ago, I’d list off these things with a happy grin on my face. These past three months, I have anxiously marked off each day until I could be reunited with the nostalgic feeling and content environment of the place I grew up. You can imagine the vulnerability I felt when I came to realize that the familiarity of home didn’t hit me when I first walked into my tiny house.

So, by now you may be asking, “If she didn’t leave her heart at home, where did she leave it?” Well, the truth is, I found a part of my home a little over a month ago when my mother came to visit me at college. The moment we had embraced a hug after nearly three months apart, I felt my heart connect to its other half that she held. I was still nearly 2500 miles away from my hometown, but I felt right at home when I was in my mother’s arms.

Not only that, but when I found myself sitting in the presence of the people I call my best friends, nothing seemed more right. My definition of the word home was finally understood. I wasn’t home because I returned to the town I grew up, I was home because I was reunited with the people I love most, the people that I trusted with bits and pieces of my heart.

I always knew that I would be different when I came back, but I never thought that I would have to relearn the meaning of home. Maybe I never understood the real definition of it until now. But thankfully I found where I will always be able to return…or who I will always be able to return to.