Sometimes I come home and I don’t recognize the smell of my apartment. It’s as if I’m entering someone else’s living space. I look around and recognize things, objects, but like the scent, they too seem to be without history. It’s as if they materialized from nothing.

The surprising thing, probably, is that I’ve always felt this way, no matter where I’ve been.

I left home at 16 and never went back. This stint in NYC is currently the longest amount of time I’ve spent in any one place for the last 15 years. It makes me uncomfortable, like I’m hiding in a place I don’t belong. The surprising thing is that I’ve always felt this way, everywhere I’ve lived. That was why I left home in the first place.

I’m nearly certain this is an uncommon feeling for people. I don’t know if it’s harmful.

Perhaps this sense and this feeling will be with me for the rest of my life. Never home.

What an unexpected turn out. Like so many things.