Where Is Your Home? Are You There Now?

Lake Margaret -- Lucasville, Ohio

Home

By Foo Fighters

Wish I were with you, but I couldn't stay
Every direction leads me away
Pray for tomorrow, but for today
All I want, is to be home

Stand in the mirror, you look the same
Just looking for shelter, from the cold and the pain
Someone to cover, safe from the rain
And all I want, is to be home

The echoes and silence, patience and grace
And all of these moments I'll never replace
Fear of my heart absence of faith
All I want, is to be home

All I want, is to be home

People I've loved, have no regrets
Some might remember, some might forget
Some of them livin', some of them dead
All I want, is to be home

“Home” was written by Dave Grohl and appeared on the album Echoes, Silence, Patience and Grace in 2007. At the 50th Grammy Awards, the album won the Grammy Award for Best Rock Album. If you are not familiar with Foo Fighters and you are wondering about the tag for the band, the name comes from the UFOs and various aerial phenomena that were reported by Allied aircraft pilots in World War II, which were known collectively as "foo fighters,”

On January 14, 1969, Dave Grohl was born in Warren, Ohio, the son of a teacher, Virginia Jean, and newswriter, James Grohl. When he was a child, Grohl's family moved to Springfield, Virginia. When Grohl was seven, his parents divorced, and he subsequently grew up with his mother. At 13, Grohl and his sister spent the summer in Evanston, Illinois, at their cousin Tracy's house. Tracy introduced them to punk rock by taking the pair to shows by a variety of punk bands.

Grohl notably served as the drummer for Nirvana before he became the founder, lead vocalist, rhythm guitarist and primary songwriter of the Foo Fighters. In 2010, Grohl was described by Ken Micallef, co-author of the book Classic Rock Drummers, as one of the most influential rock musicians of the previous 20 years. Of course, extensive touring and working on musical projects have filled his illustrious career.

The song “Home” relates a person's poignant desire to return home while being absent due to other commitments – “every direction leads me away.” The speaker craves the shelter of familiar surroundings while reminiscing about his irreplaceable past comprised of people, both living and dead, he truly loves. Like a homesick child, all he wants is to be home.

There appears to be an allusion in the work to the Beatles “In My Life,” an autobiographical song penned by John Lennon. “In My Life” was voted the best song of all time by a panel of songwriters in a 2000 Mojo magazine poll. The panelists included such famous songwriters as McCartney, Brian Wilson, Lamont Dozier, and Carole King.

“There are places I'll remember
All my life, though some have changed
Some forever, not for better
Some have gone, and some remain
All these places had their moments
With lovers and friends, I still can recall
Some are dead, and some are living
In my life, I've loved them all”

Why does our sense of “home” mean so much? Home is familiarity embedded in human consciousness. One writer explained: “Home is home, and everything else is not-home. That’s the way the world is constructed.” In fact, home is a place so familiar we don’t even have to notice it … that is, until we are away and experience a deep longing.

The magnetic property of home draws from both our heart and our mind. The comfort afforded by home is natural; it is the intimate nesting place indelibly stamped in our memory, so much more than its cold definition as “a living space used as a permanent or semi-permanent residence.” Our home is the soft place we land at the end of the day; however, the concept transcends comfortability.

In fact, for so many, home is an extension of a present physical boundary – it can be a place inaccessible to everyday reality but, instead, an easily accessible evocation of our being.

We can even muse about this consoling sense of being through statistics. In 2008, The Pew Research Center conducted a survey of 2,260 American adults. Among other things, they asked participants to identify “the place in your heart you consider to be home.” Thirty-eight percent of the respondents did not identify the place that they were currently living to be “home.” Twenty-six percent reported that “home” was where they were born or raised; only 22% said that it was where they lived now.

Perhaps most easily understood as a place of order that contrasts with the chaos elsewhere, home is the place we consider the anchorage where we can renew our honest connections with the social fabric of the world. To cite Maslow, humans need security and safety. And, higher up on the Hierarchy of Needs are psychological needs – the need for love and belongingness, where we establish intimacy among friends and forge meaningful connections with one another. We acquire most of these important needs at our home.

Where is your home? I'm sure people have asked you this question. And, you likely answered the inquiry with your present address or with your favored place of past residence. But, for many of us who have moved away or who are now unavoidably absent from the place we consider “home,” our “home” is the wonderful place tucked neatly away in our subconscious. It can be immediately beckoned by a simple cue, and the result is a release of emotions and images that can be truly overwhelming. Just ask Dave Grohl or John Lennon, or better yet, listen to their songs.

Click to play “Home”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jA4Mmk1nfPg

Click to play “In My Life”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YBcdt6DsLQA

"Home is the place that, when you have to go there, they have to take you in."

– Robert Frost