For some reason I thought you were a Chicago girl sumi. Where is your family?

whenever I go to any of the above, my brain thinks I'm going home.

I think that's kind of nice. I have a home, Chicago. But, I don't have a hometown. I was born in one city, lived in another city from age 3-10, another from 10-11, another from 11-18. My parents moved to another city when I was 18 and I went to college in yet another city. After college, I went to grad school in yet another city. After grad school, I lived with my parents for a year then moved to Chicago.

When I visit my parents, I don't think I'm going home. I think I'm going to visit my parents. Chicago is the only place I think of as going home. But, it's still not my hometown.

I was born about five miles from here.

The farthest I've lived from "home" as an adult was about 60 miles to the south.

I think this is mostly laziness and lack of drive on my part. I love Seattle, I understand Seattle, I know her to the marrow of my bones. I get cranky at newcomers who judge the city's introverted, passive-aggressive ways as somehow wrong and bad--we are a polite and suspicious people at heart here.

But I'm not in love with her.

And I know that someday, I'll probably part ways with her, because she's not exactly home.

No doubt Utica NY is my hometown. My mother was born there. I was born there and lived in the same house for my first 18 years. Then I ran as fast as I could and never looked back. There is a certain comfort of familiarity there, but never in this lifetime could I imagine living there by choice.

I've loved many of the places I've lived since then. Loved Norfolk, adored Pittsburgh, had a blast in Philly. Florida feels the most like home. After 26 years here I think I can call it my hometown now.

It seems unlikely I will stay here forever. Brendon isn't that crazy about it and there are a whole lot of cool places to live. We'll see what happens. I gave up long term planning long ago. I just go with the flow.

I was born in Pittsburgh, PA. It's decidedly not home. I left there when I was two, and left Pennsylvania entirely in 3rd Grade.

Laguna Beach, CA, is where I consider my hometown, even if I haven't lived there since I was 18. It's where I grew up, and where I still know every inch of the place, even when it changes.

Other places I've lived, including Worcester, aren't really home, so much as places I am.

Hometowns, huh. Milwaukee, I guess, though the first half of my younger life was in NYC. Montreal used to be in the running, Atlanta almost was home, DC never felt like home, let alone hometown. Which was kind of unexpected, really.

Chicago has felt like home since the day I moved here, though not hometown, exactly.

Altadena's my home unincorporated area, but it hasn't felt like home since my parents moved away. I think SF is the closest I ever felt to home.

Steph, someone emailed me this picspam, and even though I'm going to pillage it for my site, I thought you might like to have a look at the source.

I live in my hometown. It's like there's an evil spell, returning me here after brief escapes, and keeping me tethered here.

I would like to live in Asheville, as it has a great energy, plus interesting landscape, architecture, and history. But I've spent so long on the east coast I'd like to spend a good amount of time on the west coast.

DH loves the coast. Sort of like Jack Sparrow and the Pearl, the ocean means freedom to him. That's great but to get to the ocean here one has to travel through miles of totally flat land, and that feels alien to me. I like the hidden feeling of living in the mountains, but DH finds it claustrophobic. So maybe the west coast can offer mountains *plus* ocean and make us both happy.

My parents and grandparents are no longer around. I have one brother in the Chicago suburbs and another outside of Baltimore. Cousins in PA, Indiana, WA. Aunts and Uncles in NY, PA and WA.

I was born in Connecticut and lived there and PA, NJ, MD and IL through high school.

We moved around alot - but weren't military.