Noticing a trend yet? I’m a big Evernote fan. And while I’m stuck in the data roaming black hole, I’ve come to rely on it even more heavily. So here’s what I jotted down while waiting to board the flight “home:”
Can add Newark to my list of airports now too.
We’re sitting at an airport restaurant, Currito except its all lower case, except for the “T.” It’s more of a bar, really, that happens to have a four item breakfast menu. What can you do?
Little weird still, flying to YVR instead of ORD. Expect the more I do this the less it’ll seem weird. Was talking to an older couple in the security line. They’re flying back to Cali, and they asked me where home is. I had to pause for a moment and then say “Vancouver.” Practically everyone says it’s a nice city or it’s somewhere they want to visit. They asked where my original home is, and I said “Chicago” which they had been too as well and also say is a nice city.
Now that I think of it, I’ve traded a skyline for mountains. Not a bad trade really. The mountains really are spectacular.
—Sometime later—
Back “home” in Vancouver. Doesn’t quite feel like home yet. And so weird to see boats in the harbor in February.
Apparently people in Vancouver don’t take boats out of any harbor. I went for a run Saturday along Kits Beach and over by Granville Island. Pass another harbor along the way and there boats, sailboats, in the harbor. In January! Boats are out of the harbor in Chicago in October/November and stay out until May.
Yeah, so, Vancouver doesn’t quite feel like home. And I still get flustered when people ask where I’m from, even when asked by Customs Border Agents. The line of questioning from Customs Border Agents is different though. They ask where I’m coming from, what was I doing there and what kind of work do I do in Canada. That conversation is a little easier now but I bungled it the first time. The guy was nice about it though, seeing as I had just arrived for the first time.
But when people ask, I still get flustered. I still think of myself as a Chicagoan, and I doubt that’ll change. But in lines waiting for things, I imagine, at some point, I’ll automatically say Vancouver. After all, that is the final destination now.
Begs the question: what does “home” mean today?
Or does it still have meaning in our increasingly transitory world?