One of the strangest parts of moving is realizing how much emotion can live inside ordinary things. A chair is just a chair until it sat in the same corner for years. A kitchen is just a room until you remember all the meals, conversations and routines that happened there.
Creating a new home has been an exercise in deciding what comes with me and what belongs to the chapter I am leaving behind.
My painting supplies came with me.
There was never really a question about that. The easel, canvases, brushes and paint are more than belongings now. Setting up my painting space made the new place feel familiar. The faint smell of oil paint did more to make it feel like home than almost anything else.
I am learning that home is not one address. It is the people I love. It is feeling safe enough to breathe. It is having space to create. It is knowing that when the day is over, I can close the door and feel at peace.
Maybe home is something we carry with us more than something we leave behind.
