The Echo of Home

I've spent a lot of time wondering why certain places seem to pull at me in ways I can't explain, St. Augustine, Savannah. Even New Orleans. Before I ever visited, I felt drawn to each of them as though they were quietly calling my name. I was certain New Orleans would affect me the same way the others did. Its history is just as rich, its stories just as compelling, and its streets have witnessed centuries of humanity. But when I finally stood there, something was missing. I loved the city for what it is, yet it never reached whatever part of me St. Augustine and Savannah seem to touch so effortlessly. That's when I realized that history alone isn't what draws me.

Every place has its own heartbeat, and for reasons I still don't fully understand, St. Augustine feels like one my own heart already knows.

Every time I go there, I come home feeling more alive than when I left.

I've been there four times now, and every single visit leaves me with something new. Not because the city changes, but because I do. I find a new street to wander down, another old building to admire, another story hidden in plain sight. More often than not, I don't even want to be doing anything in particular. I'm perfectly content just standing in the middle of it all, quietly taking it in and imagining the lives that unfolded long before mine ever began.

I think that's what draws me there. It isn't the architecture or the museums, although I love those too. It's the people who came before us. I find myself wondering what it cost them to build the world we now take for granted. They lived through hardships that most of us can only read about. They buried loved ones too young, survived diseases we no longer fear, worked until their bodies gave out, and somehow still managed to build homes, communities, and futures for generations they would never meet.

We all struggle today, and I would never diminish that, but standing in places where history still lingers has a way of reminding me that humanity has always carried impossible burdens. Somehow, every generation found a way to keep going anyway.

Maybe that's why I feel so connected there.

I've often wondered if part of that connection comes from my own family history. My DNA traces back to Northern Europe, and as I began learning more about where my ancestors settled after coming to America, I realized how often my own life has followed similar paths. Generation after generation seemed to settle throughout lower Appalachia, and without consciously planning it, I've spent my life living in many of those same regions. It's as if my feet keep finding familiar ground before my mind realizes why.

One day I'll visit what I affectionately call "the homeland." I don't know exactly what will happen when I step onto that soil, but I have a feeling it won't be an ordinary vacation. I honestly think I'll cry. Not because I expect some magical revelation, but because there is something deeply moving about standing where your family's story began. The people who made the choices that eventually led to you were real. They walked those roads. They looked at those mountains. They dreamed about futures they would never live to see, and somehow those choices echoed through generations until they became my life.

I've always found it fascinating that places I've never been can pull at me so deeply. Before I've even arrived, I feel drawn to them. I read everything I can find about them. I write stories that take place there. I lose myself in their folklore, their history, and the people who once called them home. The more I learn about those places, the more I seem to learn about myself.

Maybe that's why my books so often find their way into old churches, forgotten villages, Scottish glens, mountain communities, and cities whose streets have witnessed centuries of ordinary people living extraordinary lives. I always assumed I was choosing interesting settings, but now I wonder if those places were choosing me.

I don't believe history is just something we study.

I think it's something we inherit.

Not only through bloodlines, but through stories, traditions, landscapes, and the quiet feeling that every now and then whispers, These stone paths have been waiting your whole life to meet you.

Maybe that's why some places feel like destinations, while others feel like home before we've ever arrived.

And maybe, in searching for where our ancestors came from, we're really searching for another piece of ourselves.