Most stories pertaining to epic journeys have a common theme – those making the journey are never the same when they go back to where they first started, and the place they first started is not the same as when they left. Although home has a special place within the heart of the adventurer, they realize things have changed upon their return. People have moved on, others have outgrown you, and most have a hard time adapting to the changed person you have become.
There is a sense that returning was a mistake. Lethargically they shuffle through the day trying to readapt. They see familiar landscape, but they no longer see it the same as before – it lost its magic.
They visit all their memorable haunts, but those memories steal the joy. It’s not the whispers of those talking about the strange man who has returned in place of the old one, but the whispers of the past that antagonize and torment. It’s the feelings; it’s the questions of what if and what could have been that linger in the mind; it’s the understanding that their time has passed in that particular place. Although home is special, and there is a great feeling of joy being there, a new place visited may have replaced the old. Home is where you leave a piece of your heart. It’s the place your mind wonders back to time after time; it’s the place you know where you belong. Home is where you need to be regardless of the other places you have been.
Sometimes home is not where you started, but one of the places you had just left, or perhaps one of the places you are yet to be. Home is the place where everything just feels right – a wordless overwhelming feeling, a bond between you and destiny – the place where you and destiny are to intersect. Although it is not the appointed time for you to stay, and you must journey a little more before you can return, it maintains a constant vigilance reminding you of where you need to be.
