where the heart is

after 2 and a half months of waiting and 10 hours of flying, i am now back on US soil in atlanta, georgia, awaiting my connection to SD. an eventless flight and scarily easy customs pass, so easy in fact that i probably could have brought that bresaola after all, and i was on my way. i'm passing away the time until my connecting flight, a whopping 5 hours from when we arrived, sitting in the food court, listening to jazz piano and utilizing free internet while sipping on my first "caffe americano" in about 6 months.

the first few hours back in the states for me are always peculiar, as my ears re-adjust to hearing english all around me, my tongue disentangles itself from the italian language, and my brain wraps itself around english syntax, all while my eyes take in the sights and smells and sounds of this strange place called "home". these should be my people, my food, my restaurants, my language, and yet they feel so foreign.

home isn't simply where the heart is, though i come to appreciate the adage all the more the more time i pass away from the US. it's also where there is the familiar, the comfortable, the quotidian that becomes an integral part of the passing of time, as if its presence were taken for granted but felt the minute it's taken away or replaced. and it's in moments of reflection, of silent observance of the "new" as it passes all around you, that once again takes you back to that which was normal.

when i am there, eventually i long to experience here, and when i am here i long to go back there, a conundrum which often leads to soul-searching. i don't have to make commitments to one place, but do know what when i'm away from there too long i begin to miss the sights and smells and tastes and experiences, the constant pique of emotions and senses. i can be away from here longer than i can from there without feeling incomplete. perhaps because i know that here will simply always be here when i want. and while i love to be here, occasionally revisiting it all, partly in an attempt not to forget, in the end all i know is that by now, there has melted into a sea of normalcy, into home.