“I See Home, But I Do Not Feel Home”

“In yourself right now is all the place you've got.”

― Flannery O'Connor, Wise Blood

I see home, but I do not feel home. These photographs that I have created resemble my own grief. But, it isn’t about a specific person. Instead, it is about the feeling of “home-woe.” I am trapped in a conundrum where I want to stay home, yet I do not feel like I belong there anymore. I see the rising division, and I want to scream to make it stop. 

My family dates back generations in the South, specifically Alabama. It has been my home way before I was even born. But, I am being kicked out like a stray dog who only wants shelter for the night. I see how the South has been frozen in time, and it is deteriorating. My chance for a better life is minimal. As I am forced to look beyond for a better life, I mourn the life I could have had and grieve the home I knew. 

I use these photographs to criticize the home I once knew. I criticize it not from an outsider’s point of view or not as someone who hates it, but as someone who grieves it. I mourn my version of the South that I remember; it was never ever perfect, but it was my home.