The Little Things That Made America Start Feeling Like Home

When exactly does somewhere become home? I can’t give you a date. It definitely wasn’t the day we landed, and it wasn’t when we moved into our first apartment either.

Home came later, and very quietly.

First came routine

Alarm clocks. School. Work. Groceries. Dinner. Laundry. Bills. The deeply glamorous things nobody puts into a moving-country story.

Our lives stopped feeling like something that was happening to us. We started actually living them.

Then came people

Slowly, we met coworkers, neighbors, other Afrikaans families, school moms and friends. I started going for lunch with other moms. We could invite people over. We had braais and made potjie.

Community began forming around us again. Not the same community we’d left behind. A new one.

And Dad was home

For years, Eben worked abroad. He always stayed connected to the girls, but being connected isn’t the same as physically being there.

One of his friends in South Africa asked why he’s working as a carpenter here when he’s a qualified electrician and previously worked as a QC inspector. His answer was simple: he comes home every night.

For us, ordinary is the point.

Then we moved into the house

There was a yard, and it needed work. We wanted the girls to be able to go outside barefoot, so we started watering and trying to make the place nice.

Not because the grass itself mattered that much. Because we’d stopped treating our surroundings like something temporary.

Home is apparently very ordinary

Knowing where I’m going without GPS. Having a reliable car. Knowing the school routine. Having someone nearby I can call. Making dinner. Complaining about yard work.

America became home when we started caring whether the grass survived. Not exactly the dramatic ending you’d expect, but it’s ours.