Jan 223 min read

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January 21, 2024

I got back to Piacenza on Friday morning after a long 24 hours of travelling on multiple planes, trains, and automobiles. I stepped out of the train station, took a deep breath (of notoriously the lowest quality air in Italy), and I felt at home. (Nothing like the smell of pollution and cigarettes!)

My month back in the States both dragged on and flew by. A month is not long enough to do all the things you want to do, but it is long enough to feel like you should have done more. I did get to do lots of wonderful things while I was home: coach middle schoolers at basketball camp, visit my grandparents, go to the ocean, spend time in Canada, host a wine tasting party, see friends, and so on. I also didn’t do a lot of the things I had planned due to snowstorms (and I’ll admit, a bit of laziness). So, thanks to the cold, I had the privilege of getting good and bored. I read a few books, watched a few sunsets, and binged all three seasons of Bluey on Disney+.

As much as I enjoyed spending time with friends and family, I really missed my friends who have become family over here. I missed my cozy apartment, my running trail, my favorite café, my day-to-day routine. I started wishing away my time back home, even though I knew I’d miss it as soon as I got back to Italy. I knew I’d miss the beauty of the Pacific Northwest. I knew I’d miss having access to a variety of foods, to people I’ve known forever, and to little comforts like a TV, a car, a fireplace, an oven, and a bathtub. It’s a constant state of the grass is always greener on the other side. But it’s also not, because even as I feel the longing for whichever place I’m not, I feel grateful to be where I am.

It's strange having two homes, because in a sense you don’t feel like you fully belong anywhere, but it’s also the biggest blessing because you realize home is more about the people than the place. I’m lucky to have many places I call home. In my adult life I’ve lived in five towns, and I’ve met many incredible people in each. It’s always hard to leave the people I love, but each time I move I know I’m right where I’m supposed to be. I feel fully at home where I am, despite a perpetual homesickness towards past homes and a true home I do not yet know.

For this world is not our permanent home; we are looking forward to a home yet to come. (Hebrews 13:14)

It’s good being back in Piacenza. I fought to stay awake until the sun went down on Friday. I went to my Italian mom’s café to say hi, grocery shopped, unpacked, then turned on the last episode of BBC’s 1995 rendition of Pride and Prejudice and woke up an hour later to the end credits rolling. I was in bed at 6:35 and asleep by 6:40. Saturday, I woke up at 4:30 am with absolutely no hope of going back to sleep, so I got up and read until the sun came up. I headed to the Saturday morning market, made a classic Piacentini dish for lunch, went to an aperitivo with a couple friends, then had dinner at a friend’s apartment. It felt so good to eat and laugh and talk around a table with other people who are calling Italy “home” for now.