A couple of years before I was born, my parents moved into my childhood home. It was a newly built house in a newly built neighbourhood. Others, just like my parents, moved in the street around the same time. The relationship my parents shared with these new neighbours started with a brief chat, and some help whenever needed while everyone was turning their house into a home. However, this connection quickly grew into fond friendships.
And here I was born. I grew up in a place where our house wasn't the outer limit of what felt like my home. This section of our street felt just as much as home. Knowing my neighbours well, almost to the extend where they felt like family, I felt very safe playing outside and being in contact with whomever passed through the street.
Looking back now, I can see how this side of my upbringing shaped my extroverted nature and my love for urban life, human connection, and public places. All because my childhood home ranged out into the street.
I can only imagine what it must be like to grow up in a neighbourhood where this sense of safety and kindness is not experienced in one's street. Or even worse, what it must be like to grow up in a house with conflict. In such situations, one's sense of home and the range of home can quickly shrink - perhaps to the scale of your bedroom.
What I have been wondering about this week is the following. To what degree does the range of our childhood home - the distance where we still feel at home - influence who we become? Is a restricted range of childhood home, due to a lack of safety or by stimuli attracting us to a specific place, a cause for people with an introverted nature? Is a wide range of childhood home a cause for people with an extroverted nature?
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