I want to take a brief moment to say thank you to everyone that has newly subscribed — thank you. hello and welcome. and I would also like to thank everyone that has been subbed for awhile — thank you. hello and welcome back. I appreciate each of you and am so pleased you have stumbled upon this place and are here with me in this corner of the net (this sounds like it’s about to get creepy, but I promise it won’t). this is the last essay on my restless thoughts about home being just a feeling and this time I sound like a liar because it’s about semi-physical spaces. also, as a side note, when I say “we” and “you,” it just means “I.” seeing constant I’s just looks like narcissism on a screen. but I guess that’s what all this is anyway, right? I mean, it is my newsletter after all. sheesh.
I do advocate home being just a feeling. I rambled on for two weeks about these feelings being at the ocean and at a party in the forest and basically anywhere as long as the vibes are right, but I also believe in three other obligatory homes that everyone has and will always have and will never be kicked out of no matter the situation until they meet their final demise. I’m referring to the homes of the body, the mind, and the earth.
Your body is your home. I’m sure everyone here has heard the phrase your body is a temple [of the Holy Spirit]. I am by no means one with a religious mindset, but yes, the body is a temple, a temple for worshipping and a temple that should be worshipped and placed upon a pedestal, for we only get one in this lifetime (but who knows how long this lifetime could last. we could all end up assimilated and placed in a Borg-like collective and live on forever in as cybernetic organisms and our body parts could be switched out and enhanced as often as we’d like — sorry, squirrel). The body should be treated with respect.
Your mind is your home. You occupy this home 24/7. It is monitored by you and you alone. You make the house rules. You are the surveillance keeping this home safe. If the bad creeps in, it is your responsibility to get rid of it. If the trash piles up, you have to be an adult, put some pants on, and take it out. Nobody else is there to do these for you. You are the master of your mind. You have to take control of your thoughts. I have come to the conclusion that humans are inherently perfect creatures creating flawed perceptions of themselves in their own world because our thoughts have all the power, thus we must stop thinking in excess. Live a pleasant life. A simple life. Create a nice home for when you are alone with yourself. Decorate to your pleasing (the doors in my home are natural redwood with bits of bark still intact).
Your home is of this earth. Humanity and nature are connected whether the conscience is aware or not and it is how we engage with our environment that determines our emotions. Our experiences are filtered through our body and mind, and our mental health is dependent on this connection. If the connection becomes lost in our dominant modern-day-technology-driven culture, then our understanding of our environmental impact and experiences may be lost. I thought the following poem was well suited here:
I thought the earth
remembered me, she
took me back so tenderly, arranging
her dark skirts, her pockets
full of lichens and seeds. I slept
as never before, a stone
on the riverbed, nothing
between me and the white fire of the stars
but my thoughts, and they floated
light as moths among the branches
of the perfect trees. All night
I heard the small kingdoms breathing
around me, the insects, and the birds
who do their work in the darkness. All night
I rose and fell, as if in water, grappling
with a luminous doom. By morning
I had vanished at least a dozen times
into something better.—Mary Oliver, “Sleeping in the Forest” (1978)
The body, the mind, and the earth are all connected, so take proper care of these homes.
Thank you so much for reading this last bit of drivel about my thoughts of home and all the feelings that come with it. I also refer to my wife as home. Wherever she is, I’m home. But what else is a home? What else makes up a home? What am I forgetting?