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I lived in Illinois for five years following high school. I was supposed to attend Loyola University Chicago, but decided I wasn't ready for college, so I got a roomate, an apartment, a job, and all the bills that go with "growing up." After five years, I moved back to Wichita.

I can't begin to count the times I've been asked why I moved back to Wichita. "You came back here?" Yes, I came back. "Why?" Why? Because it's home. I grew up here. I know here. My family is here. I like the idea of going to the grocery store and running into someone I know. I like that I don't have to commute 45 minutes to work. I love Wichita. Yes, I said it. I heart Wichita.

I'm reading Gloia Naylor's Mama Day and within the first 50 pages I read a paragraph that summed it all up for me and anyone who moves back to their childhood town, city, home:

Home. You can move away from it, but you never leave it. Not as long as it holds something to be missed. Home. It's being new and old all rolled into one. Measuring your new against your old friends, old ways, old places. Knowing that as long as the old survives, you can keep changing as much as you want without the nightmare of waking up to a total stranger.

Home.