In her book The Art of Gathering, Priya Parker suggests a few icebreakers for introducing people at a dinner party. One gathering of mostly immigrants used this prompt: “How do you think about what ‘home’ is for you?” The resulting conversation included stories of physical structures, towns, and people that shape notions of home. It was revelatory, funny at turns, and “struck a chord that was both universal and deeply personal.”

My notion of home has evolved dramatically in the past two years. I left the town where I’d lived for 12 years to return to my home state. I wasn’t sure where in North Carolina I wanted to go, which part would suit me best. I’d been gone for 19 years. We’d both evolved.

So for the short term, home was my parents’ house. I arrived a few days before Christmas in 2019, very grateful to have the luxury of taking it easy after a rough couple of years.

You know what happened next. If we’ve ever had a collective moment of pondering home, it was 2020. For some, home went from refuge to prison. For others, it was unexpected and quite welcome respite from over-scheduled lives. For me, home went retro: living with my parents.

Their home was now in a town I didn’t know, the place where they retired. I felt at home in the house, but not outside its walls.

Sugar and I hit the road this summer, spending 2.5 months living in a van. We fully inhabited that van, not just physically but spiritually - it had been a while since the two of us had a place of our own. We worked, slept, ate, read, and rode in that van mostly comfortably for 78 days. It was our home.

As I prepare to move in my next residence, I feel both sides of having a fractured notion of home: gratitude for experiencing it in many contexts, and a little sadness for not getting that deep relief, the giant exhale from that one place, with its exact things and people, that instantly tells you that you belong.

(Perhaps I’ve romanticized that last bit?)

The holidays are here. Whether you’re home or not, reflect on what home means to you. Some folks might like to read your reflections, such as:

• members of your family of origin

• childhood friends

• hosts who make you feel very welcome in their home

• friends you’ve spent or will spend holidays with

Home can also be an experience. My annual Christmas kickoff is watching Home Alone on Thanksgiving night, and I get myself to a TV for it whether I’m home or not. Kevin McCallister lives every 8-year-old’s dream: sharing a delicious cheese pizza with no one, sledding down the front stairs, not sleeping with his cousin Fuller (who wets the bed after even one Pepsi).

The fun gets old fast. For Kevin, home wasn’t about the inside of four walls. Even after bravely defending the house against the Wet Bandits, all he wants is his family.

So how do you think about what home is for you? How would you answer that question at a dinner party? Now write it out, put a stamp on it, and prepare for more joy than eating junk and watching rubbish.

Merry Christmas, ya filthy animals.