"I'll be home soon."

The idea of home is perplexing to someone like me who moved around a lot. It makes for awkward situations when people ask where I am from. Henceforth, I might start answering like one of my students who said, "My mom," when I asked where she was from. For the most part, I agree that home is where the heart is. But in some cases it is more complicated. For example, when I went to college I felt at home immediately. Really, I felt at home the moment I arrived to visit the school many months before. How did I have any heart invested in my school at that point in time? While at school I used the word "home" to describe both my school and the house where my parents lived. It could get confusing at times.
Even though I spent the longest amount of time living outside of Denver and I did call it "home", it never felt like home to me. New Orleans always felt more like home. It was kind of like base. We would move to a new city, but we would always return to New Orleans for the summer and sometimes for Christmas. I felt comfortable there.
Being in China now, home has become simply America. But when I went home to America two weeks ago something peculiar happened. My friend Shirley came to visit me at work the day I was leaving for Shanghai. She told me she was going to miss me and I told her, "Don't worry, I'll be home soon." This startled me. Home? At some ill-defined moment since I returned, China had become my home.
When I went home in January I wanted to stay in America; China was in no way my home. This time when I went home, I wanted to go home to visit. My life is in China - friends, school, and work. The only thing missing is my family. I suppose I have reached a level of comfort with China. I don't know that I will ever yearn for China like I do for America. I don't think I will ever be homesick for China. But it is still my home for now.