This is so beautiful Joy. I’m still waiting for my second life to fully birth, there’s a blurry line between the two right now and it’s a weird space to be. It felt good to go home this year. I’ve got this new little second life spark that shocks everybody at the dinner table every once in a while and it’s thoroughly exciting. I’m no longer “going nowhere should’ve got a degree Rebecca”, I’m “going nowhere should’ve got a degree but GOSH she’s a little fiery and unpredictable now Rebecca”. I’ll take that. It’s a small win and it’s made conversations that used to drown me feel like a challenge. Thanks for this piece, my goodness your writing makes me FEEL. Xxx
Dec 29, 2023·edited Dec 29, 2023Liked by Joy Sullivan
As someone that left a rural/suburban Ohio town as a young adult and having the cold shock of coming back this holiday season, this post was felt so deeply. It’s so good to be surrounded by places that you know instinctively, it’s even better to see how much you’ve outgrown them, but there is so much grief in knowing that it is not a place you could return to because it is no longer yours. Thanks much for this xxx
Beautifully said. I am still in Ohio, but I feel more and more at home in my own family that I’m making and (more importantly) in my body. I’m also happy that we’ve begun the tradition of having holiday celebrations at our house and inviting my parents in - inviting them into my home, instead of having to go back to a complex feelings in my childhood home. Also, love the containing multitudes line 😅
This resonates with me, but in a different way. My parents moved around a LOT when I was a kid, teen and young adult. I actually don't have a home town, but I have a series of small-town and backwoods memories from places we lived in briefly, felt out of place in, and innevitably left. What's changed most for me is the fact that now I'm a more widely-traveled, educated, and frankly, upwardly mobile person than most of the people I knew in my early years. Going "home" means entering any place where there are more chickens than automobiles, more liquor stores than bookstores, more people watching Real Housewives than ... well, than people who would star on Real Housewives. I always feel both at home and so completely out of place. It's a strange feeling and I'm glad that you've spoken to your own experience with it in this post.
This time around I just felt grateful for how much I've changed, how much I've discovered about myself. I felt much less angst than ever before, and it was a relief. It's taken 18 years since leaving home, hundreds of hours of therapy, and discovering my true self that was hidden by a childhood full of religious shame and fear.
The way that ghost versions of ourselves appear when we are “back home” - honest but now so obviously incomplete versions of ourselves. Like old sweaters; warm and familiar but too scratchy to wear for very long.
It’s so relatable. I’ve moved several times growing up and at 28, I still continue to be in transit most times but coming back home for holidays always felt like coming to an unfamiliar space. Now that my parents have been in the same space for sometime, and having spent a year with them during Covid, all I recognise here when I visit is my room and this house while the outside world makes me extremely anxious. I love the sun and even the night sky, but everything around is so un-relatable. Loud, judgemental, uncomfortable. But I also appreciate that my parents don’t expect me to be here long term anymore because they see how uncomfortable I feel here.
Love your way with words. I was raised in church - hit the ground hard in my 20s and had to seek God for myself, and once I did that, a lot of legalism fell away, and I began to see God in a new, amazing way. As I drew near to him , He drew near to me. I wish you the best…
“The second life you choose after the life you’re given first.” I love this line so much.
Your story is so relatable. Minus the growing up overseas, all of that religious trauma is a heavy overcoat I’m still trying to take off. Thanks for sharing your journey ♥️
This is so wonderful. I've been reading and rereading for days, and every time is spurs something new. I'm haunted by my hometown for so many reasons. It's a lovely place in lots of ways, but even from a young age all I wanted was to get the f*** out of New Jersey. Your description of a sweater that's shrunk – unwearable but familiar – that's how it always felt. When I visit now, I want to enjoy it – sometimes I even feel glimmers of nostalgia for it – but it's more and more alien to me. Itchier and itchier. I get the feeling that people there think I'm too good for it, which is just so far from the truth. The truth is that home isn't always the place you grow up or even where your loved ones are. Sometimes it's a place you never would have thought to go and then you get there and your heart lets out a deep, happy sigh. Thank you for sharing this!! Xx
This is so beautiful Joy. I’m still waiting for my second life to fully birth, there’s a blurry line between the two right now and it’s a weird space to be. It felt good to go home this year. I’ve got this new little second life spark that shocks everybody at the dinner table every once in a while and it’s thoroughly exciting. I’m no longer “going nowhere should’ve got a degree Rebecca”, I’m “going nowhere should’ve got a degree but GOSH she’s a little fiery and unpredictable now Rebecca”. I’ll take that. It’s a small win and it’s made conversations that used to drown me feel like a challenge. Thanks for this piece, my goodness your writing makes me FEEL. Xxx
As someone that left a rural/suburban Ohio town as a young adult and having the cold shock of coming back this holiday season, this post was felt so deeply. It’s so good to be surrounded by places that you know instinctively, it’s even better to see how much you’ve outgrown them, but there is so much grief in knowing that it is not a place you could return to because it is no longer yours. Thanks much for this xxx
Beautifully said. I am still in Ohio, but I feel more and more at home in my own family that I’m making and (more importantly) in my body. I’m also happy that we’ve begun the tradition of having holiday celebrations at our house and inviting my parents in - inviting them into my home, instead of having to go back to a complex feelings in my childhood home. Also, love the containing multitudes line 😅
UNreal. Raw. Relatable. GOTDAM
This resonates with me, but in a different way. My parents moved around a LOT when I was a kid, teen and young adult. I actually don't have a home town, but I have a series of small-town and backwoods memories from places we lived in briefly, felt out of place in, and innevitably left. What's changed most for me is the fact that now I'm a more widely-traveled, educated, and frankly, upwardly mobile person than most of the people I knew in my early years. Going "home" means entering any place where there are more chickens than automobiles, more liquor stores than bookstores, more people watching Real Housewives than ... well, than people who would star on Real Housewives. I always feel both at home and so completely out of place. It's a strange feeling and I'm glad that you've spoken to your own experience with it in this post.
I contain multitudes and apparently all of them are anxious. - this line is so good, makes me want to laugh and cry at the same time. X
Absolutely stunning, as usual.
I loved this so much.
I loved that instagram video ❤️
This time around I just felt grateful for how much I've changed, how much I've discovered about myself. I felt much less angst than ever before, and it was a relief. It's taken 18 years since leaving home, hundreds of hours of therapy, and discovering my true self that was hidden by a childhood full of religious shame and fear.
The way that ghost versions of ourselves appear when we are “back home” - honest but now so obviously incomplete versions of ourselves. Like old sweaters; warm and familiar but too scratchy to wear for very long.
It’s so relatable. I’ve moved several times growing up and at 28, I still continue to be in transit most times but coming back home for holidays always felt like coming to an unfamiliar space. Now that my parents have been in the same space for sometime, and having spent a year with them during Covid, all I recognise here when I visit is my room and this house while the outside world makes me extremely anxious. I love the sun and even the night sky, but everything around is so un-relatable. Loud, judgemental, uncomfortable. But I also appreciate that my parents don’t expect me to be here long term anymore because they see how uncomfortable I feel here.
Love your way with words. I was raised in church - hit the ground hard in my 20s and had to seek God for myself, and once I did that, a lot of legalism fell away, and I began to see God in a new, amazing way. As I drew near to him , He drew near to me. I wish you the best…
“The second life you choose after the life you’re given first.” I love this line so much.
Your story is so relatable. Minus the growing up overseas, all of that religious trauma is a heavy overcoat I’m still trying to take off. Thanks for sharing your journey ♥️
This is so wonderful. I've been reading and rereading for days, and every time is spurs something new. I'm haunted by my hometown for so many reasons. It's a lovely place in lots of ways, but even from a young age all I wanted was to get the f*** out of New Jersey. Your description of a sweater that's shrunk – unwearable but familiar – that's how it always felt. When I visit now, I want to enjoy it – sometimes I even feel glimmers of nostalgia for it – but it's more and more alien to me. Itchier and itchier. I get the feeling that people there think I'm too good for it, which is just so far from the truth. The truth is that home isn't always the place you grow up or even where your loved ones are. Sometimes it's a place you never would have thought to go and then you get there and your heart lets out a deep, happy sigh. Thank you for sharing this!! Xx
As someone from Ohio who also went West… this resonates with me so much. Thank you for this.