what is home?

I read an article, or a collection of stories, on what home is to different people who now live outside their home country. And I thought to reflect on what that means for me.

I’m recording this on Granola by the way, so I don’t think I’m going to edit it. I’ll probably just publish it as is.

But anyway.

What is home to me?

I think home, for me, is where I’m under no pressure to do things I don’t want to do at any point in time.

It’s interesting because I grew up at home with my parents, and when I think back, my favourite part of living at home was just the ability to chill and have everything done for me.

Even now, when I go back to Lagos for work and I see my mum, she still does everything for me. When I’m at my brother’s or they’re at mine, they do everything for me. It just feels like, okay, I’m at home.

When I’m with my friends, it just feels easy.

And I think about that a lot because I’ve also lived in places that were mine, but I still had to make things happen. It wasn’t as comfortable.

I think that’s the more literal meaning of home for me.

But also, home is not necessarily London, even though that’s where all my friends are right now and my community is here. So it makes sense that I would be happy living here.

But at the same time, we all end up being by ourselves for long periods.

And I actually quite like that right now.

If I think about what I did today, I woke up, went for a run, came back. My living room was very clean before I slept last night. Then I cooked later in the afternoon and just left things.

And I left things because it’s my house and I can do whatever I want.

So I think home is also adulthood.

But home is also people that I know will always have my back.

Home means people I can leave the door open with. I don’t have to think about whether the door is locked.

It’s very interesting because every time I sleep by myself, I check that my front door is locked. But every time a friend is around, I don’t check.

And I’m realising that as I’m saying this for the first time.

When someone is around, I don’t check the door twice.

And that’s home.

Home is where I’m comfortable enough to know that I’m safe.

Home is where I know that these people have my back.

Which is probably why work is not home.

And if I think about earlier in my life, when I first came here for my masters, it clearly wasn’t home.

But I remember being in Nigeria and spending a lot of weekends at my friend’s house at some point, and how much that felt like home, even though it was a very small space.

So I think that’s it.

Home is where people are for me.

I’m recording this while I’m at home, not doing anything, and also fighting with the fact that I’m not doing anything.

People say I like activities, but I don’t think I always do.

I like people around.

Home is where my favourite people are around. I don’t need to be doing anything with them. I just like the feeling of people who bring me joy being there.

Home is where I can look at people I love doing something and it excites me.

Home is where I can feel that there’s another human being somewhere in my space.

That’s my favourite kind of home.