Where on earth a person belongs
Photo by Stacey Warde
By Stacey Warde
I have lived in exile most of my life, self-imposed, no ruler or tyrant but me.
I put myself in the place that doesn’t feel like home, not unlike standing on the edge of a cliff or sleeping with the enemy. I like testing myself that way apparently.
Musonius Rufus, banished into exile by the Roman Emperor Nero, said one may as well make himself at home wherever he lands. Those who loved you, he says, where you once lived will love you still, no matter where you are now.
I think of those condemned to die. I would, at this point, choose exile over death but leaving, departing, any place can feel so final, the door closing, putting an end to thoughts and ideas about where one belongs.
In exile, you may actually be better off, Musonius says. You may come out on top of the world. Stronger, more resilient, better trained and equipped for the hardships life brings, whether at home or on the road. Exile will turn you into a philosopher, or make you stronger by demanding only what is essential to live. What need is there of luxuries and sweets? The good life is the hard life, the one that challenges you.
At war with myself, the hearth I long for — the warm place of welcome and rest among friends and family — eludes me, always a pilgrim, a wanderer, in exile, seeking a landing and finding none, wanting someone or something along for the journey, a familiar, like the sweet aroma of a good strong cup of coffee or a quick sloppy blowjob.
“You don’t want to be alone,” Faith said to me once, long before she died. She too was searching for home, and did her best in an old folks’ trailer park, where she served the finest dinners with her best friends and silverware properly set, a habit she acquired as a debutante in a grand house of great influence many years ago.
No rest for the wicked, she’d say, poverty stricken and happy in her own way.
I’m in “transition” and have always been, I told her, moving from birth to death, as so many of us do, seldom stagnant, game for the thrills, without the phone, eager to eat ass. She’d laugh. I identify as he/him and prefer to eat women’s asses. Faith loved to laugh and laughed best at bawdy humor.
My home, sort of, is my body, which is its own type of exile. Everything changes, even and especially the lines on my face and skin. No roof repairman or plumber can fix those, the sagging and aging skin, the march toward the end.
WHERE does one actually live? Where does one go to see the movies or to see visions and to meet with old friends? When leaving jobs, family, or the familiar? On the way to the gallows? Or on the way to the desolate island of Gyaros?
Stacey Warde is publisher of The Rogue Voice. This article first appeared on Substack.
