A Spirituality of Homesickness

Last month, on a road trip, I left my wallet at a maple syrup stand in Western Massachusetts. I didn’t realize this until we were 100 miles away. But my friend Mel, who we’d been visiting, lives down the road and was able to grab it and mail it along to our next stop in Maine.

Mel is the garden manager at my beloved Gould Farm, a land-and-community-based rehabilitation center for adults with mental illness. She and I lived and worked there together over twenty years ago. She moved back with her husband this past year to take this job and Adam had never seen “the Farm” so we went for a visit.

Mel also grows things indoors: there are two, big, beautiful begonia plants in the sunny bay window of their woodsy cabin. When I asked if she would rescue my wallet, I asked if she would mail some begonia cuttings, too.

The cuttings arrived, wrapped in wet paper towels inside a plastic bag, with my wallet at our friends’ house in Maine. They traveled with Adam and me the rest of the trip – staying in two hotel rooms and riding in our car cup holders all the miles back to Indianapolis.

But as it turns out, four days of bumpy travel wore them out. After we got home, they “failed to thrive” and eventually withered up and died on me. They didn’t get what they needed to survive after being cut away from their roots.

I also know something about feeling uprooted, these days. I don’t think I’m going to wither up and die or anything, but I have been surprised how disoriented I feel, living in a new place these past two years

We moved to Indianapolis in 2020 to be closer to about a dozen of our seminary and clergy friends who ended up here. Another friend is actually arriving next month, and still another next year – both with spouses and children in tow. See, many Disciples of Christ (Adam’s denomination) clergy end up here because the national headquarters and a seminary are here, and a lot of Episcopal clergy (my denomination) have come here, too, drawn by the excellent, pastoral leadership of our friend, Bishop Jennifer Baskerville-Burrows.

It’s wonderful to be near friends but it’s been harder than I expected to uproot my life to a new state. Strange, because I’ve moved all around northern Illinois throughout my life, with no problem. I am surprised how dislocated I’ve felt in central Indiana. Is it really so different? Somehow, for me, it feels like a unfamiliar country. The trees are different (less oaks and cottonwoods, more sycamores and tulip trees). The dirt is different, and even the light. I feel squirmy and dissatisfied with our new neighborhood and the house we bought, finding many silly things I don’t like.

Until recently, I thought something was wrong with me. I thought I was being overly-sensitive, picky, and stubborn. Why couldn’t I relax and see all the good in our lives here? There’s nothing wrong with Indianapolis. The famous author / vlogger John Green lives here and he gives it four out of five stars.

But I’ve spent eighty percent of my life in northern Illinois. Maybe transplanting an old tree like me takes time. My roots had grown deep and wide across the Chicago area. When we go back for a visit, I get this feeling of locatedness, like I know where and who I am in a way I don’t in Indiana. Am I just a weirdo? Super sensitive to my surroundings?

But recently, the word “homesick” also appeared in my life. I don’t remember if my brain retrieved it or if I read it someplace. But it was so freeing to think: I’m not weird or immature or cranky, I’m homesick! The feeling had a name. Homesickness is a normal human emotion.

We develop relationships with places that can go deep, just like with people. Breaking up with a place can be like breaking up with a friend, or even a marriage. Maybe moving can sometimes even be like a death, if you’re a refugee or an immigrant who can never go home. I wonder if we underestimate the interconnection of who we are and how we are, for better or worse, with the places we live. Maybe we are like plants in this way, sending out roots that grow around all kinds of things in our lives, searching for stability and emotional connections.

I came across a book called “Homesickness: An American History” by Susan J. Matt. She tracks through letters and newspaper articles how homesickness as an emotional phenomenon in the United States changed with the industrial and capitalist revolution. Homesickness in adults - missing far away people and places — used to be considered considered a sign of integrity and love of family. But now, most Americans define homesickness as something children experience and must be taught to resist – something to grow out of, to let go of. In adults, it’s rarely spoken of.

Adam has had no problem moving. Some folks travel constantly and thrive doing so. Other folks grow up or live in a place they don’t like, and they want to shake off those roots as quickly as possible. So, maybe our roots grow differently. Or maybe while I feel homesick for a place, others might feel homesick for a certain time in their life, or a time in our national life, or even for a place and time in the future - perhaps an imagined home or reality or existence we hope to find ourselves in one day.

Homesickness may be part of being human; a part of our spiritual condition. Augustine wrote, “O God, our heart is restless until it finds its rest in Thee.” I wonder if we are always longing for something that we don’t have, or for a time and place now lost to us. And yet, that doesn’t make our longing irrelevant or immature. Longing can be a way to know better who we are and what’s important to us, even if we can’t act on that longing.

Finding the name “homesickness” has helped me honor what I’ve been feeling in this move. Places can become a part of us, part of who and how we are in the world. Is there a place, house, or landscape that feels like a friend or family member in your life? What place, time, or reality are you homesick for, these days? How can you honor your longing, instead of fighting or judging it, even if you can’t act on it? I will be asking myself these same things.

Postscript: You’ll never believe this, but Mel’s begonia leaves have not been my only botanical roadtrip companions. Adam and I once took a flat of pepper seedlings to Nashville to visit my friend Sarah and her family back in April 2009. They were too tender to stay at home alone without someone to water them and coddle them, so they came along. I love the name the seed company gave them: “Pizza My Heart” dwarf bell peppers. They survived the trip, got transplanted into plastic tubs on our Bolingbrook balcony, and produced a fine bounty of peppers that summer.

OTHER NEWS

My latest book is now on Kindle — Everyday Connections: Reflections and Practices for Year A. Year A begins with the First Sunday of Advent on November 27, 2022! Delve into scripture study with questions and insights that will make you think about your own life and world in a way that I hope is both serious and surprising…

Signed bookplate — I’d be glad to mail a signed bookplate to you, free of charge. Just fill out this form on my website.

Advent is coming…! My book Advent in Narnia was featured by Presbyterian Outlook again this year as a recommended resource for adults and families. This is its seventh year and I am delighted that it continues to be loved and used by readers.

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Until next time, friends.

Heidi