I wrote this a few weeks ago on the way back from visiting Providence, and I’ve only just had time to type it.
February 8
I’m on the bus on the way back to New York, and we just passed the Motel 6 where I spent my first night in Providence (my first night above the Mason Dixon, actually). It was almost 8 years ago, the summer after my junior year of high school, and I’d convinced my parents to drive me to visit colleges up the East Coast. Boston was our final destination before we turned around to head home, but that morning I casually suggested from the back seat, “Maybe we could stop and look at Brown. I mean, just to see it. Since it’s on the way.” I remember my mom was driving, and we didn’t want to wake my dad up. We took an exit for Providence, and we ended up on Atwell’s Avenue on Federal Hill, which is a place I would end up liking very much. But it was very late that night, and there were a lot of tacky neon lights and I couldn’t help but think it looked trashy. Back then, my dad didn’t get hotel reward points yet, so we stayed in the cheapest non-scary hotels we could find. My mom and I would talk my dad out of the Motel 6 and 8s when we could, but sometimes it was the only option. (“They all look the same with your eyes closed!” he loved to repeat.) The hotel was gross. Brown I loved—maybe the only thing I ever loved at first sight, apart from puppies and bookstores. Providence left me skeptical.
I’ve been thinking about home and what it means. I’ll be leaving New York at the end of May, and I have no idea where I’ll go next. Will I be able to bring my bed? My car? Will I get to buy the dog I’ve been wanting? Will I have a roommate? Will I live in a house or an apartment?
I’m fascinated by the relationships we form with places. When I got to college, Providence felt like home before Brown did. Brown would end up feeling more like home than anywhere ever had. Columbia’s writing program felt like home right away. I’m still not sure New York ever will.
I’m not sure what makes a place feel like home, but I know the people are part of it. Yesterday was the first time I’d been to Providence since I moved out of my dorm on the day after graduation. There’s hardly anyone I know left in the city. I didn’t know what it would feel like without the people there who made it home for me. And the weirdest thing was, apart from the people, everything was exactly the same. Everything about it felt familiar, everything almost thoughtless because I’ve walked the same sidewalks and gone to the same places so many hundreds of times. I’m the one who’s different. This is always how it goes with the places we know the best. Brown and Providence will always have been my home, but they belong to someone else now. But just when I thought that I wouldn’t see a single face I knew, one of the students from the first year I worked in Europe came in the cafe where I was sitting. She’s a junior now (how is that possible?). And I was reminded again how small a place like Brown can make the world seem.
Coincidentally, that trip eight years ago was the first time I ever saw New York, too. It left me awed and satisfied and with no strong desire to visit it again.
The snow in Providence is piled taller than my head. I’d forgotten what it’s like to be without a car in a place where transportation is slow and unreliable. Another huge storm is supposed to hit tomorrow, so I had to leave a day earlier than I’d planned. I slid my way down the sidewalk to wait for the next bus and thought, It’s okay, I don’t mind going home.
I list the places I’ve lived for any length of time, and I stop and consider whether or not the list would be the same if I listed places that felt like home, instead. Henleyfield, Oxford, Providence, Rome, Segovia, Athens, Durham, and New York—but instead of eliminating places, I feel like I should add more. Picayune obviously belongs on the list. New Orleans. Destin. Boston.
I sat in my favorite coffee shop today. I used to arrive before the shop opened at 7:00 just so I could claim the best table, and then my best friend would join me when he woke up a couple of hours later. I texted him a picture of the cafe counter, the chalkboard menu. “Home!” he said. And I guess it still is. I guess we can have more than one.
