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I found myself, one day , wondering why I felt so homesick, while sitting in the comforts of my house of eighteen years. A house is just a building with walls to separate the rooms. A home is a feeling of safeness and stability. A home will offer you shelter from the hurried, coldness of the outside world. A house will offer you shelter from the weather. The difference in a house and a home reside in the people that live there. Do you feel nurtured and sheltered from the outside world? Can you relax in your home? If you answered, "Yes, I would say you were at home.

Everyone was gone and I was in this space , all alone. I had felt this exact same emotion, when I was seven years old,when I had relocated to live with my father in his tiny apartment. My father made certain , I had my own bedroom, but I immediately felt homesick for the house , I had grown up in. My grand parents were there , along with conversation, familiar things and all of the things I knew and loved.. This new house was not home. I missed the people who had made the house I lived in a "home".

Each day, in my grandparents home, fresh flowers were cut and brought into the home and placed on the kitchen or dining room table by my grandfather. In that new house, only a plastic table cloth and the loneliness of a sparse kitchen greeted me with each meal. I had lost my appetite and no longer felt like eating all alone in that house, that never felt like my home.

Finally one day, I called my grandmother and said, "I want to come home." She sounded a bit flustered , then she said to me, "You are at home". Distinguishing a house from a home was apparent to me , even then, at seven years old. That place , that I spent so much time alone, absolutely did not feel like the home I once knew.

The next time, you look around your surroundings, take notice of what makes you feel at home. You will find that it is not those freshly painted walls or that new sofa or chaise. For me, it is the familiarity and the people I love, that makes it home. Real Estate agents will advise you, when selling your house or property, to take down all personal effects,those family pictures will have to come down. Someone else will have to picture your house , their new home. The colors you chose , will have to be subdued, sure that color made you feel warm and cozy. That color for someone else may cause a panic attack. A house is not a home. Where ever your digs are, you can make it your home.

Learn more about this author, Ganelle Davis.
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