I’ve lived in more than 20 different places in my life – New York City several times, Washington, Boston, Cambridge, Mass., Philadelphia, Dallas, New Jersey – and it is a wonder and a joy to come to a place in life where I can say with certainty that I have moved my last. Barring something I cannot yet foresee, I have made my last move, I have come home, I have landed, out of the desert and into the life I was destined to live.

Cambridge is not a perfect place. It has the same troubles much of America, much of the world has – poverty, conflict, the confusion of rural life, the clash between newcomers and old-timers. It is not paradise, any more than a farm brings the perfect life. It is just that I have learned this about moving:

-Nirvana is a fantasy, not a real place. When I move, I bring my life and all of it’s troubles and shortcomings with me, no matter how green, no matter how pretty, no matter how remote. At some point, I learned in life that I must come to terms with who I am right where I am standing, with my face in the mirror wherever it is. I can move my physical body, change the view, but my troubled soul cannot move and is not cleansed by a change of scenery.

–  Whenever I move, I become a refugee, just in a different place. Moves tear up connection, disconnect me from family,  community, isolated me from the past. They bring great stress and confusion, they tear up the universe.

– Moves have brought me rebirth, renewal, opportunity. They brought me things to write about, they brought me love, and finally, to the beginnings of community. They are signposts on the hero journey, I have learned to be careful about them, they can bring darkness as well as light, even in the most beautiful places.

So finally, the prophet lands, the pilgrim on the journey stakes his piece of land, makes his claim to home. I am done with moving, this is my stand, my truth, my community. For the first time, I know I cannot just pull up and run, go elsewhere to hide, there are no more fortresses or moats to protect me from my world. I make friendships here or nowhere, find my community here or do not find one, make my home or remain a wanderer, doomed to stand outside of the glass looking in for all of my life.

So life is mysterious and wonderful, I am sometimes the mystic wandering in the fields, I have blown like a weed all the way here, and taken seed. Cambridge is my home now, I have planted my flag and taken root. I will be here long enough to know the place, and for the place to know me. And finally, there is so much peace in that.  I am done with this rootlessness, this searching, this quest. I am here now.