And it is not even strange really; some people are just...wired to explore the Earth, whereas you and I are wired to keep the home fires burning for the explorers to come home to. Because of them, civilization and society has grown. I gotta tip my hat to them, really.
Oh, I can explore the Earth - I loved the times I was deployed aboard ship in the Navy, visiting Northern Europe, the Mediterranean countries, and the Caribbean - but in the end, it's nice to have a home to return to.
I left Maine shortly after graduating high school in 1984 for the U.S. Navy. I left the Navy after 4 years and spent another year in Virginia Beach, Virginia, where I was stationed. My friend Chris begged me to come back to Maine so I did. But after 2 years in Maine, I was working a part-time minimum wage job at a Kmart that just barely covered my rent and barely saw my family, even though they were fifteen miles away, due to not being able to afford a car. Another high school friend suggested San Francisco as a good place to move to and start a new life. So I sold everything I could, packed my remaining belongings into enough bags I could carry, and hopped on a Greyhound bus for the 3000 mile journey to SF.
Once there, I had to make my way in the City with no money, no place to live, and not knowing anybody. So I did the homeless thing for a few months - sleeping in shelters and eating in soup kitchens that fed the homeless. Eventually, I found a social service organization that sent me out on casual labor jobs and gave me a room in a SRO (Single Room Occupancy) hotel or bedsit. It was a small room, but it was warm, had a soft bed, and I didn't have to share it with anyone. I did eventually score a full-time job with the agency, and left my tiny bedsit for a larger and nicer one in the neighborhood of South Park; right next to some pokey little magazine called "Wired" - I wonder what happened to them?
My time in SF was spent moving from job to job and neighborhood to neighborhood until 2001, when I started my current job with the USA's largest telecommunications company. In 2003, after my office in SF was closed, I took a transfer to Sacramento where I've been ever since.
All was right in the world - or at least satisfactory - until 2009, when a new law in the state of Maine that unsealed the original birth certificates of adoptees went into affect. I got my original birth certificate and used it to track down my birth mother. I found her in New Hampshire, called her, and we started to get to know each other after over 40 years apart. I found out that I have two half sisters and two half brothers. And after I met them last year, I finally understood what people meant by the bonds of family. I had never really felt that bond with my adopted family - I always felt like a stranger, searching for a place where he belonged. Well after meeting my birth family and seeing what we all had in common, I
knew where I belonged.
And my birth mom sealed the deal last fall when she asked, "When are you coming back home?" Something that my adopted mom had never asked me in 19 years. After that, I was miserable. I had a home, but couldn't afford to leave my job here to return to it. When my co-workers and I were given the news in March that our office in Sacramento was closing, inside I was shouting
"YES!"
tl, dr: In two months from now, (more or less) I am heading Eastbound on Interstate 80 to move to New Hampshire and be close to my birth family. I finally feel complete and feel like I have an actual home to return to. It's a good feeling.