Recently, I found that I am going to be moving from Vancouver to Grande Prairie up in Alberta. All this recent talk about nature and cities as living (or inanimate, whatever) art, has got me to thinking about the 'home' thing in general.
I recently read a very bizzarre and intriguing book called "House of Leaves" by a fellow named Mark Z. Danielewski. I must say, it is one of the few books I've read by a modern author that was not solely for the purpose of entertainment. It was about two men and their journals. One, a man named Johnny Truant is a live-on-the-edge, drug-addicted man whose life has been nothing but punishment, and he wants to know why. It's a rhetorical "why" that's never really mentioned, but through his pain and his need to identify with others, we see this. He never really had a home. He lived in many places, but never in a "home," that is, never in a place that he was safe, comfortable and happy.
He was shuttled from foster home to foster home when he was younger, and suffered much abuse during that time. The book is about Johnny, who finds the writings of a blind old man named Zampano who tells the tale of a fictional movie about a man named Navidson whose house is bigger on the inside than it is on the outside. Johnny is drawn into these works of Zampanos, wondering why anyone would go to so much trouble to write a case study on a movie that never existed. Johnny identifies with Navidson and soon becomes like Zampano, a recluse and quite eccentric. He needs to know more about this house in which Navidson lives and refuses to believe that it isn't real.
The story is always bringing up the meaning and concept of what a house/home is. It deals with the concept of Navidson not living in a home, but being controlled by a house and Johnny's need to identify with something. He wants reassurance. It is a very captivating read and a rare find nowadays. I suggest you track it down. I really identified with what I found within the pages. I myself have lived in 15 houses in my 17 years on this planet, and I found recently that I had only ever felt an attachment to a place when I was living in Grande Prairie. I suppose, that is where my home is.
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