I was born in New Jersey, just across the George Washington Bridge from New York City. My Dad was born in Brooklyn, NY and spent most of his life there. It was always his home , at least I thought it was.

We left there suddenly after the research my Dad had been doing at NYU was destroyed or lost...never was clear on that...but my Dad was desperate to finish his PhD and begin teaching. So, he quit his job and we moved to Oklahoma and after a lot of hard work on his part, he got that degree.

I think he always thought he'd go home and teach at one of the many colleges and universities in the area. But, he had a family to feed and needed a job ASAP and there were no jobs there at that moment. He did, however, find a position at WVU in Morgantown, WV and he took it. He said at the time that this would be a stepping stone to another, better position at a bigger school back in New York.

I was 12 and had been promised I'd be going home. That was where all my friends were. I was not stoic about this turn of events and didn't make the best of it. My mother just cried a lot and started packing.

We arrived in Morgantown at less than its finest hour. Dupont had a plant there and they were not even a little interested in conserving the environment...guess it was a bit early for that. Anyway, when they fired up each morning, the entire town smelled like rotten eggs....lots of rotten eggs. I had asthma back then so I was pretty much confined to the house during the week when they were in operation. If I ventured out it was with one of those respirator things that asthmatics carried around.

For a short time we lived in a down-and-out motel. Nothing to be cheery about in this picture. My parents set out to find a house. Living in that motel didn't help any of our moods.

They found one that they could almost afford. Remember, this was 1954. The house cost $9,000 and they were worried about how they'd pay the mortgage. It was the cheapest, reasonable house they saw so they bought it. We moved in and within a month or so, Dupont had closed down its operations. I could breathe at last.

My parents lived in that house until my Dad died and my Mom could no longer take care of it or herself. It went through lots of changes and many improvements and while the amount of time I spent living in that house on a full time basis was very short and I did hate it and Morgantown thoughout those years, it was and always will be my home.

When I was preparing to take my Mother out to Santa Fe to live and I knew the house was to be sold, I wanted desperately to buy it. It was once again in terrible shape. Something happens to older people and they stop noticing that the carpet is thread-bare and the walls really need a coat of paint or new wallpaper. My parent's house was well beyond that, it needed a whole re-do. But, as I stood in their back yard looking out over the twenty or so miles of mountains, that was their view, I got a lump in my throat and realized for the first time that I loved the place and the town and probably always would. I spent a few hours trying to figure out how I could go home again and then I realized I couldn't, so, I didn't buy it. Instead, I picked my Mom up at the hospital and flew with her out to her new home.

A nice young man bought the house though and, from what the neighbors told my Mom, made it into a wonderful home. One of the things I hope to do now that we are living back on the east coast is go back for a visit to Morgantown and take a look at the old neighborhood.

I went through this whole story because I was taking the long way to an observation I came to regarding what makes a place your home.

I had been thinking about my Dad and remembering how he loved West Virginia. It was incongruous to me. Here was this guy from New York who would carry that New York accent with him all of his life. He was so far from his roots and all that was familiar to him and yet he was in love with this place. His professional life never got him to where he hoped he'd end up but he had found his home.

After my Dad passed away, my husband and I took a trip to Scotland and, in our explorations, came to the place where my Dad's ancestors had lived. I will never forget driving that narrow road which wound along beside a reasonable large river and coming around a bend and realizing in an instant why my Dad might have found WV so comfortable and beautiful and right. The spot where his ancestors lived looked so much like WV it could have fooled a native. Now my Dad never actually made it Scotland. His family were happy to have escaped and only returned home if they had to, which wasn't often. But, I think some genetic coding resurfaced when the man ended up in WV and he knew he had come home.

And now, even though I love Georgia and have no desire to leave it, if asked, my home is West Virginia. I arrive at that realization quite happily far beyond the angst I felt about the place as a teenager. Home is that place that always tugs at your heart, comforts your soul and remains filled with good thoughts.

That's what I believe.

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