Yesterday's post about Money magazine ranking Claremont #5 on the list of top 100 places to live in the U.S. got us thinking about what defines home and who exactly defines it.
As hard as it may be for some of the Claremont 400 (Helaine Goldwater, Paul Held, Valerie Martinez, Diann Ring, Ellen Taylor, Judy Wright, to name a few) to believe, this for us is home. One sets down roots, builds a home, raises a family, makes friendships, lives and loves, celebrates successes and overcomes failures, and without even realizing the place grabs hold.
All of us have a stake in the community, and it represents the sum of each and every one, not just a few or 400. We've each of us added our voices to the chorus (or cacophony) and what emerges is a music unique to the place. Measure by measure the place weaves it's way into something fundamental to our being.
With such an investment of time, energy and love, why would we ever want leave? Why would you? It's our home, and yours, too. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise.
Thinking those thoughts reminded us of the Anna Ahkmatova poem "Lot's Wife," which is a kind of feminist poem to be sure, but which is also a poem about home and roots.
But a wild grief in his wife’s bosom cried,
Look back, it is not too late for a last sight
Of the red towers of your native Sodom, the square
Where once you sang, the gardens you shall mourn,
And the tall house with empty windows where
You loved your husband and your babes were born.
From Lot's Wife
by Anna Akhmatova
Translated by Richard Wilbur
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