Home should be a place where our hopes and dreams can be realized.

I often think about the tree I planted – with the assistance of my maternal grandmother – in the back yard of my childhood home.

I brought the sapling home from school. My third-grade teacher, Mrs. Stevens, always had a side-hustle project for those of us interested in learning about nature and how to grow things. We would stay after school, feeding our caterpillars milkweed plants, and watching them eventually metamorphose into a chrysalis and finally into a Monarch butterfly. We planted seedling packets that Mrs. Stevens would eventually let us take home for transplanting once they sprouted.

I was already a green-thumbed junkie thanks to my grandmother. In fact, we planted the tree – I have no recollection what kind – not far from where she first taught me how to turn dirt over, dig holes and start my own little vegetable garden bed.

I haven’t lived in that home since age 17, when I left for college. But I haven’t been able to shake the desire to see the tree. I used to drive by the house slowly, trying to catch a glimpse into the backyard, when I worked at my hometown newspaper over 10 years ago now. It took everything for me to not ring the bell and ask the owners if I could come in – to see the inside of the house, yes, but also to ensure my tree was still standing.

Because for me, that tree signifies home and all the memories that come along with it. Home is where we should feel our most secure and peaceful. Content. Relaxed. Joyful. Those days in the garden with my Big Mama brought me a sense of belonging, a deep sense of the history of my family’s Black southern roots and how they grew most of their produce.

What does the word ‘home’ mean? Probably a lot of different things to most of us. It’s something I’ve thought about frequently since August, when the owners of the house I was renting informed me they were putting it on the market. I was suddenly untethered, forced to search for a new peaceful sanctuary, a place to lay my head, work, relax, write, garden and cook meals for myself and friends. 

I wanted to spend the year exploring the trials and triumphs of those who have lost their homes, those who are fighting to stay in their homes, those who want to reclaim their homes and those who are seeking a new home.

The first installment is about a group of Indigenous people in northwest Washington who were forced out of their homes. It’s a heartbreaking story that mostly centers around the lack of empathy and the lack of humanity we experience when we refuse to see a common connection.  

But ‘home’ can and should offer common ground in America. It should be a place where our hopes and dreams for a better life and liberty can be realized. A place where we feel unburdened from outside stressors, at least for a while. 

And it’s a place to plant a tree and watch it grow.