It’s seen in “Finding Dory” when Dory is finally reunited with her parents. It’s Elsa in “Frozen ll” when she finally finds a place she seems to fit and it’s Dorothy in “The Wizard of Oz,” clicking her heels as she delivers the iconic line “There’s no place like home.” The feeling of arriving home is universally portrayed and experienced, whether returning to a familiar place, being with beloved family or friends or discovering a new place that provides a sense of belonging.

According to a journal published by Environmental Psychology, written by Jeanne Moore, “Placing Home in Context” the factors that determine what “home” means to any one person is largely contextual.

For sophomore Margaret Bonin, the scale of what she considers home changes based on her geography. “When I’m in Minnesota, or like, near it, home is my house. But then when not in Minnesota, home is Minnesota,” she said.

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WELCOMING WILDERNESS. For as long as she can remember, Iris Bergad has been making a trip up to the Boundary Waters in the summer, where she spends time with her friends and family. (Submitted by Iris Bergad)

Bonin also finds she can feel at home in various places, even beyond the borders of Minnesota.

“My grandparents’ house in New York [feels like home],” she said. “It’s cozy … I’ve just been there so much I know everywhere around it. I just know it.”

Sometimes familiarity can be enough to feel at home. Home is a large and situational concept and can mean a plethora of different things. Despite its complexity, “home” is often used to describe residency in day-to-day language, a place to ultimately return after each day.

Though home is often seen as a fixed place, its comfort and familiarity can emerge in experiences, routines, or fleeting moments that create a sense of belonging.

Likewise, ninth-grader Tarq Johnson initially made this association. “The first thing I think of … is my house,” he said. “And then … where my dog and my family usually are … then I think of it as where I can sit down and read a book or do my homework.”

At the most basic level, Johnson said home is where he sleeps. “I do a lot of camping. So like, when I’m out on trail, sometimes home is just the tent, and that’s fine,” he said.

Ninth-grader Iris Bergad also has experience making tents feel like home. She has been a camper at YMCA Camp Menogyn for almost her whole life. “Camp [feels like home] because I have fun there…I’m with my friends.”

That easy feeling of being at home is not necessarily solely evoked by location either. “My dad’s cooking, I guess, makes me feel at home, and since I have a pet cat, just cats, period,” Bonin said.

The things that make a home and the things that each person hopes for in their ideal home may also differ greatly depending on demographics. This year, Habitat for Humanity, a nonprofit dedicated to building and improving homes for those in need, published a story in which they posed the question: “What does home mean to you?” Many responses represented the necessity for comfort, and the joy of being around loved ones. Many others praised the mere stability and security that having a home to return to promised.

While the literal definition of home may change depending on who is asked, where you are, or where you are going, the feeling of going home is universal. Whether it be returning or finding it for the first time, it is a sense of belonging, safety and security that cannot be constrained to the idea of one place.

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