Lingering Feeling The Mountains example essay topic

My definition of home is not a word I can say or a thought I can think, but a feeling. This feeling is like a calm that settles over me like a blanket, just a quiet assurance telling me I belong in that place. It took me forever to understand where exactly that place was, and the answer was always right in front of me. This feeling would come and go, and I would never recognize it because I knew that only my address and the house that I parked my car at and went in to eat and sleep for 18 years was my home.

I never realized that the place I lived wasn't my home, and I really didn't want to either. When I was a child, I would accompany my family on Sunday outings. We would drive up to the mountains for a picnic or to take short hikes. I would hop in the back of the big burgundy minivan and watch the scenery change as we winded up the mountain roads, continually saying, "Are we there yet?" Every time though, I would look around at all of the trees and the mountains, and feel the sharp cold that it brought in the early fall through winter.

I would get that feeling then, but wouldn't know what to do about it. I just thought it was the weather or the mountain air that was doing it. I came up here fly fishing once with my father and we camped in a state park somewhere up here. But I really didn't want to leave, even though it was two six foot plus men in a small tent. There was just a lingering feeling the mountains gave me.

Needless to say, the location was one of the determining factors that led me to choose this college. Since I've begun to live here I have had that feeling that this is my home. But it took me a few weeks to realize that. What led me to the realization of this was a trip I took last week. Tuesday night while sitting in a lonely nursing home my great-grandfather's long and successful life came to it's end. Since my mother didn't have a strong father figure, she was pretty much raised my him and was close to him all her life.

I could tell when she called me to tell me that he had died that she wasn't doing so well. I knew I couldn't come home then since I had classes on Wednesday, so I decided to come home after my last class that afternoon to be with my mom. I left the school in the afternoon and got home as it was just beginning to get dark at good old Rutherford ton. I pulled up to the house and immediately it hit me that it wasn't my house anymore. I was a very frightening realization, knowing that I had lived there all my life and still feeling like this. Mom met me at the door and I greeted her with a huge pile of laundry, since the washing machine and dryer at the house didn't accept quarters.

My great-grandfather, or paw paw, lived beside my house, which now had a handful of cars in his front yard and a white wreath on his door. Mom looked like she was doing ok, but I could tell she wasn't her normal, preschool teacher self. I looked around the house as I walked through the door and everything looked so much smaller, kind of eerie looking. The living room looked dark, even though the lights were on. The vibrant dark pink walls were now just a dull shade of maroon, the tan carpet was almost brown. They still had the big screen in the middle of the room, which was a vast difference to the television I was used to watching.

It was just so odd seeing all of that empty space in one room. The couches were even rougher to the touch than I had remembered them as, and still the dark blue color and pushed away from the wall a foot. The whole house just had a weird feelings about it, like I had never been there before. I knew instantly that things were different. I talked with my mother for about an hour or so about my paw paw in the kitchen. I asked her if he died peacefully, and she said that he didn't feel any pain, just stopped breathing and went away.

I asked her who all was there, and she said that she was the only one by his side, his sons were too busy to be with their dying father. I told her that I figured it would be like that, and she just gave me a half smile. So I apologized for not getting there sooner and she said it was ok, that school's very important and how I needed to do my best. She then told me that paw paw had said about an hour before he died as his sons were bickering about the will that I could have his binoculars that I had played with as a child.

She went into the living room and got them for me, and they still looked the same as they did years ago. The kitchen looked especially different, since it had been so long since I had seen a kitchen of any sort. The counters were the normal super-sanitary clean, since my mother is such a cleaning freak. There was a pile of dishes in the sink, making it obvious mom hadn't been in the kitchen too much in the past few days.

It still felt like I had never been there, though. I looked over at the oven and tried to see myself over at it taking out an oven pizza and running back into the living room, but I couldn't do it. I looked in the refrigerator and saw the familiar two gallons of skim milk that are replenished every few days. I tried to picture myself trying to cook on the range of the oven, but that image was even harder to grasp. Imagine having to actually cook your own food. That's a scary thought.

I felt so empty in that house, it was so scary. As I sat in the living room on the couch watching a really dumb movie that came on one of those corporation channels that play ten minute commercials every fifteen minutes. All of a sudden it hit me that I was doing the same thing that I did for almost six years before I came to college. Sitting the same way, with a drink and a big can of Pringles at my feet, watching a stupid movie just to pass time. I knew mom and dad were upstairs but I felt that feeling of loneliness that was common when I was watching stupid movies at midnight.

Again I realized this isn't my home anymore. I decided to call it a night. Trying to get to sleep in my old room was a horrible experience. The room had such a negative energy to it. I could see a figure huddled on the side of the bed on the phone, fighting with a significant other. I looked at my empty desk and could see another Brent-shaped myself wasting away with the dull glow of the monitor lighting the room.

I my empty desk and looked at where all the trophies and awards used to be, now boxed up in the attic. I never liked my room to begin with. It was very small, the wallpaper gave it a very tight feeling. I had a queen-sized bed so my feet wouldn't hang off as bad and it took up most of the space in the room. There was just a feeling that it wasn't where I was supposed to be.

The walls started closing in, and sleep became completely out of the question. I knew I had to get out of there. I stumbled my way downstairs and ended up sleeping in the backseat of my car. The next day was more of the same feeling while driving around that quite, desolate town. Most of the stores closed down thanks to a Super Wal-Mart that was built last summer, giving a ghost town appearance.

The town looked like a ghost town, I could picture the tumbleweeds rolling down the streets. I went by my old workplace and didn't go in, just stood outside and watched the buggies sitting in the coral, like I was waiting for a former image of myself to run out there and push them in. Everything was just so wrong, I knew I had to get out of there. I decided to leave after the receiving friends part of the funeral. The funeral itself was going to be held Friday morning, and I knew I couldn't make it since I had classes that morning. By the time I got back to the campus, it was already dark and I had to carry a full laundry basket along with 60 dollars worth of groceries all the way up the steep hill behind South Ridge, so I didn't get much of a chance to appreciate the feeling that I got when I pulled into the parking lot.

Just about everyone in the hall was watching a movie in my room and I was lying motionless on the floor, but I had a calm reassurance seeping through my mind. It wasn't the people there, it wasn't the building, it wasn't my girlfriend asking me if I was ok, it was just that feeling. Waking up the next morning in my own bed was a glorious experience in every way. Just hearing the roar of the air conditioner and the light seeping in through the closed blinds, combined with the mixed smell of pizza and floor cleaner, gave me such a wonderful feeling. As I went through my morning ritual I had an extra step in my stride, whether it was brushing my teeth or sipping my coffee while listening to music. As I was going to my first class I went out the side door and immediately the crisp, sharp mountain air hit me.

I walked around the partition and saw the huge trees right outside my window, and just looked around at everything as if I had been given a new set of eyes. The mountains give off such a beautiful glow at all times during the day and night, giving me that feeling of comfort and security that tells me that this is my home.