So tonight is a somewhat melancholic topic inspired by another thread upon this board. Upon the subject of finding comfort, or more precisely that feeling of home.

It's a simple thing isn't it, recalling the last time you felt truly at "home", truly comfortable. No concerns, no worries, just the simple warmth of believing all is right with the world. Any man who claims not to miss it is an outright liar for every man desires peace in his time for both himself and those he loves. He desires the warmth of a comfortable place he had once called his own, be it memories of his childhood home, a place he spent most of his younger years with his friends or the simple feeling of love at close grandparents or family members. It all seemed so simple then did it not? I recall even in my own childhood looking from my open bedroom window of the seemingly endless vista of London and in my innocence thinking "I'm glad I'm home". I would sit on my bed with a glass of coke, maybe play the playstation a little before turning on the radio and listening to evening call in shows while the sun set over the metropolis before me. Even on the chilly nights I'd leave my bedroom window open, listening to the distant city for it's noises comforted me. In a way I still miss it to this day. Oh, don't get me wrong, I absolutely despise the city of London, what it has become and was probably already becoming back then with it's degenerative undercurrent, it's a pit. But in my young mind it was home, the sprawling suburbs where I'd meet with friends, play some football (or soccer as it is also referred) even though I was terrible at it. All of it gone now. Memories of a simpler time always seem so beautiful don't they?

There in lies the issue though. They are just memories, moments gone. In desperation some seek to keep in that feeling, holding onto those brief moments in the hopes that even for an instant they can feel that again but truthfully it can never be done much. It always puts me in mind of a man looking back upon his first love and asks "what if" as if the thought of it will offer that feeling of fiery love once more. There's a particular phrase that comes to mind concerning this, "You can never go home". In essense this is true, we can never go home for home isn't there any more. Whether like me you saw your city engulfed in the unending torrent of diversity and it's ensuing corrosion, whether you grew up rural and seek revisit a place long abandoned, nothing ever feels as it did back then. The walls crumble, the people have left or passed on, the shell of it is just a sad reminder of all that has been lost. Even the strongest of Men feel a pang of melancholy at such things.