Home for the Holidays

By Ella Harrington

If you were to ask me, seven years ago, where I thought I would be spending Christmas, I would tell you the same answer as always: home. 

Just a short stroll along the cobblestone streets near my Tudor-style house, tucked away amid lush green hills and sprawling fields, and there rested my grandparents’ quaint home. My parents would trail behind as I led the way for the annual Christmas Eve supper. There was no need to knock on the door, for I knew it would be unlocked by open arms always waiting on the other side. Even the cows on the nearby farms seemed to join the festivities with their occasional lowing. 

When I was a little girl, home was the red brick house in the middle of Knaresborough with flower beds tied up out front. Home smelled like my granny’s perfume and fireplace smoke, crackling with stories. Home was the Knaresborough Castle watching over the town, its weathered stones bearing witness to centuries of history. Home was watching the Queen’s Royal Christmas Message, always before breakfast and gifts. Home had a beautiful sunlit conservatory with love in the form of vegetation. Home was “The Holiday,” playing every December weekend on the telly. Home was Yorkshire puddings, mince pies next to the Christmas crackers, and all the love anyone could have asked for. Home was my mother’s tight old bedroom, where all my sisters and I would sleep in one bed when we visited the grandparents. Still, it was home. It was the best home I’ll ever dream of because home was with family. My entire life happened in that home.

Then came America. The land of the free and the home of the brave, or so they said, but when I moved in the summer, it didn’t feel like that to me initially. I felt as far away from the pages of a storybook fantasy as I had in my homeland. Leaving England felt like a first breakup; while maybe they were not the love of your life, they surely offered that initial sense of attachment and belonging. Everyone and everything afterward would be compared to them. It took me a while to understand that dear things don’t last forever. I miss knowing how to get around without maps and knowing which drawer the spoons are kept. Even the moths knock, begging to make a home here. This house doesn’t know me. Not yet.

But as winter approached, I found myself looking out the living room window of my new town. While the new view of my house didn’t look upon River Nedd or roundabouts, the window reflected Greens Farms church, and suddenly, I was reminded of what was looming. Christmas. That December of 2016 would be my first Christmas spent in the States. The first snow had just begun to fall, and the big Christmas trees glittered yellow and white, reminding me of the cozy holidays back in England. It was this time of the year that made America feel warmer and more inviting. In those moments, I realized that America, too, had room for the traditions and memories that I held dear, and so it was during that holiday season my love for this new land began to take root.

As I write this, I am caught between what was and what is. Almost like a love triangle. Looking back, I understand that home cannot be confined to a single place because home was looking forward to Christmas ending since that meant Boxing Day was next to celebrate. Home was the washing machine in the kitchen, making the whole house smell like laundry detergent. Home lingers in my heart when I return across the Atlantic, visiting my grandparents once or twice a year. In the meantime, home has grown into something more. Home is still eating roast dinners, just under a colonial house. Home is going to the Gaelic-American Club with American family friends on Christmas night, searching for a place to serve the same fulfillment as going to our local town pub back home. Now, home is Sunday Night Football, although not the one I would watch back in England. Home lives between these two worlds, bridging the gap with a sense of belonging that knows no borders. Finally, I am home.

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Ella Harrington, a sixteen-year-old Connecticut native, is an enthusiastic rising junior who is deeply absorbed in writing, movies, and books. Her profound appreciation for cinema harmonizes with her love of literature, inspiring her to uncover parallels and disparities between storytelling in writing and through the cinematic lens.