Moving

Since 1996, I've had 14 different mailing addresses, but until recently, I have never felt at home.

My family moved from Bangkok, Thailand to Brooklyn, New York when I was three, in search of a better life, but for most of my childhood, I couldn't find that better life within the walls of my own home because of my father.

When I was six, my dad would tutor me by angrily asking me why I got the wrong answers, instead of helping me find the right ones.

When I was eleven, my dad ignored me when I brought good news home from school, and when I said, "I hate this family," he came to my bedroom to physically silence me with a coat hanger until I took those words back.

When I was sixteen, I showed my dad my PSAT score of 680 but instead of congratulating me, he shouted at me through my bedroom door for six hours because I wrote that I was interested in the low-paying subject of, "psychology.”

For most of my childhood, I fantasized about hopping on a subway with nothing but a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and knocking on the door of a friend's apartment, hoping their parents would adopt me like Brangelina adopted Maddox. I never did it, but it probably explains why I find so much comfort in a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

That's why, when I applied for colleges, I chose to move from one big city to the next: Binghamton, NY, population 48,000.

For most people, leaving for college is a moment of celebration, pride, and support. When I left for college, I packed two luggages, got on a Greyhound bus, and dragged my belongings up a hill into an empty dorm room by myself.

As I spent four years away, I could not shake the feeling that I didn't belong. I felt like I was being watched, like I was doing something wrong, like I wasn't doing enough to justify my time there.

I felt safer here but I barely made any lasting friendships, because I was afraid that the people closest to me would hurt me the most.

When I graduated from college in 2015, I moved back home with my father and my sister. My bedroom walls that were once plastered with Playbills from Broadway musicals I'd seen, programs from shows and concerts I'd performed in, and poems I'd written were now blank, and I felt like who I was before I was eighteen was erased.

Being home felt like traveling back in time and very quickly, I felt like my father was always waiting for a moment to tell me I was doing something wrong.

When I decided to move out after a year, my sisters demanded that I helped pay my dad's mortgage, and I thought to myself, "why was I going to pay for the home of a man who had made sure I never felt at home?”

Even after I moved, I felt guilty for a long time. Like I didn't deserve peace and quiet. Like everything I grew up with was normal. Like none of the fear, anger, and shame I had felt was real.

Even on my own, I didn't feel at home, but people would tell me that they felt at home around me.

A roommate of mine, who moved from Massachusetts to New York knowing no one, wrote me a thank you note for making this city feel like home to her.

During my Zoom birthday party, a friend told me he felt like he belonged, even though it was just a screen with pixels of strangers.

My partner tells me I feel like home to her.

When I went to my father's home for Thanksgiving this year, I felt like I'd traveled back in time again. My father told a kid he'd been tutoring that he must not be very smart and had thrown out my sister's belongings while lying to her face and laughing about it.

After dinner, I went to see what was left of my childhood belongings and found my high school yearbook. When I read the notes my friends had signed it with, I cried.

My friends wrote how much they were going to miss me, how many fond memories they had of us together, and how far they thought I was going to go.

I didn't believe any of these words when I was eighteen because someone at home always told me how horrible I was.

I felt like I had found pieces of myself that I had lost a long time ago. I felt like I could see myself in the way that people saw me.

One quote that stood out to me the most was a note that said, “babe, your voice is going to take you so far.”

A few weeks later, I caught up with a friend I hadn't seen in 20 years who's known me since I was six. He saw that I was doing stand-up comedy and said it made sense to him because, as a kid, I was always giggling and carrying a huge grin on my face.

It's moments like these that teach me what it means to come home. I can love and forgive my father, but I won't ever feel at home with him.

I feel at home when I'm with people who make me feel seen.

I feel at home when I'm safe to be, know, and celebrate exactly the kind of person that I am.

I feel at home when I can create that space for the people around me to feel the same way.

Today, after fourteen moves, I know that I can feel at home wherever I go.