They say to write what you know best, but I suppose I have transplanted too many times to know anything but my own soul best. And so I write about this.

I know this may irk the stay-at-home mom whose life is a series of ebb and flow normality, or the theologian who feels that the soul is a mere mirror and not worth the time I spend on it. It may bore the businessman or collegiate. But I know no other thing on earth well, so from this I build my stories.

I am jealous of the homesteader, the one who has birthed generations in the same house, who has first steps on the same ground as first kisses and then their own child's miracle steps. I am jealous of dialects and regional habits. I want a language that identifies me instead of the mashup of history, people, and landscape that I call home. I say that everywhere is home, because it is, but partly because nowhere is home and to say this out loud is hard.

Christ is home and in this I take comfort, but it sounds more cliche than true, so I'm careful about how much and to whom I say it. You doubt me even as you read that, I suspect.

Because to be homeless, save Christ, is not popular, not even recommended. So go home, come home, people say. But you should know this, when you say that, my soul answers: I am home. Wherever I am, I am home.

Or my soul asks: where is home?

If it is with people I love or people who love me, then I am home. If it is where I grew up, then it is impossible to return. If it is where I grew most, how does one quantify that? If it is with blood and kin, my home covers the globe. If it is a church, a sanctuary, then I am making my own and building it with others. If it is simply the place where I am most myself, then I will always be homeless.

If, however, it is Christ alone, then there is no matter my dialect or my region, I am home wherever and there is never anything to leave or to come.

And so, I am home.