A previous question pertaining to the topic of home and place was given feed back by a student at Saint Leo University. I bring her back to share some more of her thoughts on the topic and and issue. Thank you Danielle for your support in my writing.
Home is a place that people hold dear to them. They often think back on fond memories with their family members or missed friends. For college students, this is a very familiar pattern. Missing your family and friends back at home is very common for those who might not have been away from home before and for the very first time, experience home-sickness.
Danielle, a college student (freshman) at Saint Leo University, had a very hard time adjusting to the new setting. I interviewed Danielle after her response to a public post on Facebook concerning how home can be where the heart is. Her response to my question was very moving. She believes that if you “are not happy with where you are from, or don’t necessarily find comfort with your family, you can and probably will seek comfort elsewhere.” LaDue also explained that home does not need to be a specific place, and that home can be found in a person.
LaDue believes that home can be many places instead of one specific place. For example, a person can call the beach home, or really any place that they fell in love with. “The term home has a completely different meaning than the word house, although they both share relativity, home has more of an influence on someone’s life versus a house, which just provides shelter,” LaDue explains.
I asked her to explain more about finding home in a person since she is the first person I have heard that response from. She clarified with the example of her college experience being so far away from home. Being from Annapolis, Maryland, LaDue is very far away from her family, whom she holds near and dear to her heart. She is finding the sense of home at Saint Leo by surrounding herself with people who she shares connections with. Her current roommate, who has been her friend since they met in their orientation group, cares a lot about her, as she does for her roommate. She also has a boyfriend whom she met on campus and spends a lot of her time with. She finds both love and comfort from these people and due to that, feels like she has found her sense of home in both of her friends.
