Home. It’s not a mythical idea and everyone has a vision of what it is, but what actually makes one? To answer that question, I think that everyone must come up with the answer for themselves. I found mine one unsuspecting evening.

I think that best way for me to express my answer to “home” is to give an analogy that most people would understand. We have all gone away on vacation or a business trip or even a weekend away. Regardless of whether or not the time away was amazing or a complete bust, there is usually a point in the time away where you get this urge to return to some other place….usually that’s going back to where you live. It could be that you just want to sleep in your own bed with your own pillows and blankets. Or that you just want to access other different clothes or shoes. Or you miss the water pressure in your shower. Or it could be something as simple as the smell. Whatever it is that triggers that desire to “go home,” when you get back and are able to experience that thing (or things) that you missed, you usually let out a sigh of contentment or relief.

And it’s that sigh that defines “home” for me.

Only that sigh happened for me when I was away from my home  traveling overseas. Kind of backward right? It came when I walked into Dominick’s apartment after our first “date.”

[back story] That evening wasn’t supposed to be a date. I had asked him to get some coffee with me so that I could explain that I was in the country for only a few weeks and that there was just too much going on in my life at the time to be involved with anyone…not to mention that I was bouncing from one country to the next every few weeks. It was hard for most guys to accept, let alone someone actually living in another country. Oh well. We see how well that “let down” turned out! 🙂 [/back story]

Turns out that we shut down the cafe talking and headed back to his place for more coffee. Walking across that threshold, the feeling of contentment that rushed over me was unlike anything else that I had experience in my life. There was something about being within those four walls and knowing that he was in them with me that completely put my soul at ease.

And that’s when I sighed.

After almost 8 years of marriage and living in numerous apartments and houses, I still experience that sigh. The only thing that’s been a constant in all of those locations has been him.

Over time I’ve realized that my idea of a house is about having a level of comfort. It’s about knowing that we have the right items in our house that make it relaxing for us to be there. Regardless of the number of square feet or the location, having what we need is a wonderful feeling, but knowing that he’s within those four walls with me makes it a home.

And that’s why this blog is called casa logalbo. It’s all about our home and the random projects that I come up with along the way to get it to that comfortable and relaxed level that’s pleasing to us both.  Now about that tagline…

Some of you may know that it’s really a lyric and the song that it comes from. Others of you not so much, so here ya go. It’s called “Home”  (appropriate right?) by Edward Sharpe and The Magnetic Zeros and part of the song goes:

Home, let me come home, home is wherever I’m with you
Our home, yes I’m home, home is when I’m alone with you

Yeah, it just fits.