It's Not How I Thought It Would Be, But It's All Right

I love the Chronicles of Narnia, both the books and the movies. I love the adventures of the Pevensie children, I love the mythical creatures, and I love the way that Aslan interacts with the world he has created. I especially love the story of the Pevensies as Walden Media is telling it this time around in the films, especially Prince Caspian. (If you haven't seen the movie, don't read this if you don't want me to spoil a plot point or two.)

I know a lot of people don't like Prince Caspian as much as the last film (certainly evident by the ticket sales), but I love it. I love the way that the Pevensies struggle with their frustration at being kids again when they used to be not only grownups, but kings and queens. I love how they struggle with faith in Aslan. I love how the White Witch comes and tempts them, and is defeated by the only Pevensie who really knows exactly what it means to serve her.

To me, the central theme of The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian is the idea of what it means to be home. Perhaps one of the reasons I love the film so much is that I often struggle with this concept. They say home is where the heart is, and the Pevensies certainly left their hearts in Narnia when they returned to our world. I'm fairly confident in saying most of us would rather live the life of a king or queen in a magical wonderland full of life and joy than a life of rationing and fear of being blown up in WWII era England. But, it's more than that. The Pevensies spent more time in Narnia than they did in our world. They grew to adulthood. They learned what it meant to be kings and queens, commanding respect and honor, and then returned to a world where nobody listened or cared about what they had to say.

Then, after all their hoping and longing for a return to the world they had left behind, they finally return to Narnia. And, when they arrive, they find Narnia subjugated by a foreign enemy, their castle a mere ruin, and so much time has passed that everyone they cared for and knew in Narnia was long dead. They were no longer even the heroes of their own story. And that's the point. Too often we spend all of our time hoping and wishing for a world that no longer exists. We dream of home as this place where everything is always okay, and the world can't get to us anymore, but that's not what home is.

As a college student, I've learned that you really can't ever go home again. Not to say that I don't love my parents or enjoy spending time with them. But, when I do, I'm not home anymore. What was home is now just a collection of memories. I've reached the age where home is going to be whatever I make of it. Ultimately, home is merely a state of mind: the place where you are most comfortable. The place where you truly feel as if you belong.

And that is what the Pevensies found when they returned to Narnia. They didn't find the place they remembered, and they didn't find what they had hoped for, but they did find peace and contentment. I guess another way of saying you're home is saying that you are comfortable in your own skin. We spend so much time and energy chasing after a dream, a fantasy, a mere memory, when all along home is right here waiting for us when we accept that home can only be what we make of it.

“The Promised Land always lies on the other side of a wilderness.”

I've Got My Memories Always Inside of Me, But I Can't Go Back to How It Was

Apparently not many of those of you read this are fans of Stoic Philosophy, so let's try something else.

Family (an appropriate topic considering it is All Saint's Day) and Home are both words which carry lots of different meanings for lots of different people. For me, family doesn't have to include people who share your genetic code, but I do think that there has be some link of commonality in the relational bonds which tie us to those we consider to be "brothers" or "sisters" or "mothers" or "fathers", otherwise, their wouldn't be any reason for such labels to be used. Home fore me also does not simply mean the place where you are currently living, but carries the implication of the place where you feel most comfortable. The people I call family are certainly not all related to me (and there are some people who are related to me who I certainly wouldn't call family). In the past four years, not all of the places I have been living have been home. But, especially in college, family and home both become very fluid concepts.

Nowadays, when I make the long and arduous 45-minute trek to the house that my parents live in, it certainly doesn't feel like home (although they do feel like family). I feel welcome, I feel the warm embrace of hospitality, and I certainly feel like I am among friends and loved ones. However, I don't feel like I am home. I merely feel as though I am a guest in the home of someone else. A welcome guest, who can make himself "at home", but it's not my home. Not anymore.

This same feeling somewhat applies to the members of my more extended family. They feel more and more like acquaintances. Perhaps this has something to do with my tendency to maintain some level of emotional distance from even close friends due to past feelings of betrayal or abandonment, but perhaps not.

I've reached the point in my life where I will never be home again until I have created a home of my own, and to some extent the same applies to family. And as I stare into the abyss of adulthood, the abyss stares also into me. Or something like that.

So, I pose to you, o faithful reader, a two-pronged question: How do you define family and home?

“The Promised Land always lies on the other side of a wilderness.”