“Home is where I want to be,” begins Talking Heads’ famous song “This Must Be the Place (Naive Melody).” I recently heard this song on a road trip up to Pennsylvania; well, two different covers of it: The first by Kishi Bashi and the second by The Lumineers.
I fell in love with it immediately. I’m a person who really focuses on songs’ lyrics, not so much the melody. These lyrics resonated with me deeply as I drove through America’s northern states. Nostalgia and epiphany are strange bedfellows; I felt them both while listening to the song.
Home is an odd concept, especially when you’re a college student. I’ve found myself feeling homeless, in the sense I have too many to have one official “home” anymore. There’s my family’s house in Concord, there’s my apartment here in Chapel Hill, there’s St. Anthony Hall, there are the couches of my best friends’ houses and then there are people abroad and in different cities who feel just as much like home as my childhood bedroom.
It’s taken a while for Chapel Hill to feel like home. It’s weird to feel placeless. It’s even stranger when you start to reflexively refer to your college town as “home.” As a junior, I often think of how in less than two years, I’ll likely leave this home behind for a new one.
I had a lot of qualms about not studying abroad. I spent a few semesters hem-hawing over whether or not it was the right decision for me; ultimately, I decided to stay put. I feel some regrets now, but then I remember how it feels to be grounded.
I think of being able to get into my car and know exactly how to get to my friends’ houses in Carrboro. Studying abroad, while a wonderful experience, seemed always just out of my reach. It’s hard not to feel like you’re missing out on a big experience, but at the same time, I feel like I’ve found my feet at UNC. Maybe I wouldn’t have found that feeling had I gone to England as I so enthusiastically planned when I was a first-year. Part of me wishes I’d pushed myself to find a new home abroad, but then I look around campus and know I’m happy here.
It feels like home when I’m driving on Rosemary with my windows down, passing all these people who live their lives just like I live mine. I feel at home when I cut through the Carolina Inn and smell the lemon air freshener. I feel at home when I walk through the Pit late at night and the streetlights are the lights that guide me on my way. I feel at home when I realize two and a half years have passed here and it feels like no time at all. Maybe I would’ve lost these feelings if I went elsewhere, abroad or to another university entirely.
Chapel Hill is not perfect. Sometimes I still feel like I might have been happier elsewhere; but, hey, the grass is always greener somewhere else (maybe in Europe, but who knows). So for now, to quote the song, “If someone asks, this is where I’ll be.” I’ll be here because as many homes as I might have, this one feels like a good fit. I guess that this must be the place.
