Finding home is one of my favorite tropes to read. I even wrote a book about it. And I’m fascinated by the concept of home.

Home.

What does that word mean to you?

I’ve been thinking a lot about it these past few weeks when I’ve been traveling back…home?…to Sweden.

For those of you who don’t know me, I’m a Swedish woman living in Malaysa since 2012. The first 39 years of my life, I lived in the same small town in Sweden. It’s located at the midway point between Stockholm, Sweden and Oslo, Norway. I was born there, I grew up there. My friends and family were all there. For the longest time, I thought I’d die there. Not really by choice, but because it didn’t seem that life had anything else to offer.

I was wrong. My husband got a job offer, and suddenly we had options. And we grabbed the opportunity like two drowning people holding on to a life buoy.

We moved from Karlskoga, Sweden (population 27 000) to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia (population 7 200 000). Across the world, both literally and figuratively. Life in a Muslim country is very different from life in liberal Sweden, even small-town Sweden. But despite feeling like an outsider in this community (I am, believe me – a bisexual outspoken woman like me can never really fit in) it feels like home.

When I first moved here, I went home to Sweden for a visit. But all these years later—after spending two weeks in Sweden—I go home to Malaysia.

But this last visit made me think about the concept of home. You see, my daughter, who turns 24 in February, still lives in Sweden. She moved away from our old hometown to attend university in Norrköping, Sweden.

I’ve never lived in Norrköping. Before she moved there, I hadn’t even visited. But when I stay in her guest room, I feel like I’m home. On the other hand: when I go back to Karlskoga, that’s not home anymore.

My parents and brother still live there. Most of my friends are still there. All the memories from the first 39 years of my life are connected to that place. I got married to the love of my life in the garden of our tiny house in the city center, where someone else lives now.

These days when I go back, I just want to leave. I look around at all the familiar streets and houses and restaurants and shops and think How was this ever home?

How come I feel like a stranger in a place where I lived for 39 years of my life, but completely at home in a big city almost 6000 miles away from everything that’s familiar? How come I feel at home in a place I never even lived?

The answer is simple, of course, at least for me.

Home isn’t the house or apartment I live in and where I keep all my stuff. Home is where the heart is. I’ve heard that old saying a gazillion times, but I’ve never felt it as acutely as I did during those two weeks I spent in Sweden in January.

So yes. Home is currently here in Kuala Lumpur where I keep all my stuff. But it’s also in a lovely little apartment in Norrköping where I’ve only spent a few weeks in total.

Who knows in which apartment or house I’ll live in the future? Or even which country. But one thing I know for sure: as long as I live with my husband, it’ll be home.

Home.

What does it mean to you?

My obsession with the concept of home makes me want to read more stories about people finding their homes. Any recommendations would be greatly appreciated, either here or you can ping me on social media 😊  

Nell Iris is a romantic at heart who believes everyone deserves a happy ending. She’s a bona fide bookworm (learned to read long before she started school), wouldn’t dream of going anywhere without something to read (not even the ladies room), loves music (and singing along but let’s face it, she’s not Celine Dion), and is a real Star Trek nerd (Make it so). She loves words, poetry, wine, and Sudoku, and absolutely adores elephants!

Nell believes passionately in equality for all regardless of race, gender or sexuality, and wants to make the world a better, less hateful, place.

Nell is a 40-something bisexual Swedish woman, married to the love of her life, and a proud mama of a grown daughter. She left the Scandinavian cold and darkness for warmer and sunnier Malaysia a few years ago, where she spends her days writing, surfing the Internet, enjoying the heat, and eating good food. One day she decided to chase her lifelong dream of being a writer, sat down in front of her laptop, and wrote a story about two men falling in love.

Nell Iris writes gay romance, prefers sweet over angsty, and loves writing diverse and different characters.

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