49 moving, can almost touch the girl I used to be. But in Minnesota, I have my growing up years, I have trees and lakes and books. I remember the woods, the birds, the rock beaches of the North Shore. I remember chasing goats and lightning with my best friend and jumping on the trampoline. I remember winter every year, my world bewitched into a snow globe. Because when I think of home, I think of snow. Snow is moldable. I can fall back upon it, make an angel imprint of my form. I can stamp myself onto the earth. But eventually, it will melt. Spring will waltz in and chase away the snow and that mark will disappear into the dirt. As I wander through my snow-encrusted memories, I realize every one of them has disappeared. And I wonder, is the idea of home constant? Is it irrevocable, tied to your birthplace or the four walls which surround you? Or is it more transitory, something that can be shaped but must also change? In about a year’s time, I will be living in Ohio once more. Thirteen years of my life will be neatly packaged into “that time I lived in the tundra.” I will exchange forests and rivers for cornfields and narrow roads. Nobody will know the city of Coon Rapids and I’ll forget where Cincinnati is. They won’t know what it means to “go up north.” They won’t know why I love and hate winter so much. And it won’t snow as much. I’m wishing home would stick to my fingers like the ice outside my window. I wonder how I’ll learn to let go, if I can learn to associate home with anything else.
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