Heartland.

They say that home is where the heart is, but lately I have been grappling with the concept of belonging. Maybe it's because COVID has rendered me temporarily homeless (in an extremely privileged "I do have a roof over my head it's just not technically my roof" kind of way). Change is something I am very familiar with, due to circumstances beyond my control and the fact that my parents are serial house renovators but there is something I find deeply unsettling about the world grinding to a halt.

At twenty one, I have moved exactly twenty one times, lived in two different countries and have resided in three different provinces at one time or another. I was supposed to be able to add Mozambique to the list this year but alas, Mr. Corona had other plans and pulled that rug right out from under me with one contagious tug. I was born in Zimbabwe and spent my first six years of life running wild on Binder Farm, surrounded by my family and wide open spaces. They say that your youngest years are the most important of your life from a developmental point of view and I like to think that is why, although six years is a blink in the grand scheme of things, my time in Zim fundamentally shaped who I am.

The way I grew up brought out a sense of undeniable solidarity in me - and although I will never be able to comprehend the trials and tribulations of the Zimbabwean people, I will always be connected to them through their unwavering resilience. You have probably heard it said that Zimbabweans are the most friendly people in the world. Well I can confirm that is true and their kindness makes me proud to carry a piece of their spirit within me as I walk through the world. On the other hand, is that spirit really enough to be able to call myself a Zimbabwean? How can it be, when my Shona has disappeared entirely and my everyday references have gone from Corn Curls, Flame-lilies and Lake Mac, to Braaibroodjies, Protea's and the Stellenbosch wine route?

I was six years old when we moved to South Africa and my internal struggle for identity began. Sleepy little Fish Hoek soon became my new normal and I fell in love with the sea, the people who welcomed me and the way the air smelled the morning after the Cape Doctor had visited. By the time I was in my last year of high school, we were living in house number fifteen. Then came the big move to the student town of Stellenbosch and all of a sudden I wasn't one of the "valley kids" anymore. So who was I? My university experience was my first attempt at independence and one hell of a learning curve. I wish I could say that the three years that I spent there were all happy years, and that I had the time and freedom to "find myself" and immerse myself in the student culture, but if I'm being honest I only really pulled my head out of the sand and enjoyed where I was in my final year - just in time for me to leave it all behind.

With the end of varsity came some difficult questions in need of answering - Are you going to go to China this year to solidify your grasp of the Chinese language and make your degree worth something? Are you going to do your honours in Chinese and stay in Stellenbosch? Where do you see yourself living in five years if it isn't South Africa? What is the next step towards your future? In the end, what I decided was that I essentially had no idea how to answer any of those questions and so would have to take a gap year in order to organize my thoughts and figure out what I wanted. That is where Mozambique came in. As I readied myself for yet another adventure to another country. Fixing up the house so we could put it up for rent, clearing out clutter, selling furniture and mentally preparing myself to part temporarily with almost fifteen years worth of worldly goods - I began to feel, more noticeably than ever before, a strong sense of inner insecurity. Who was I without all my possessions and the sentiments that they carried?

Discomfort hit me in waves during the packing process and as I sorted through the boxes in our garage, disturbing spiders webs and lifting layers of dust into the stale air, my memories resurfaced. My toy cow on wheels that I used to ride up and down our driveway on the farm. The cowrie shell that my granny picked up on Muizenberg beach that still sounded like the ocean. The incense sticks that I used to keep next to my bed in Stellenbosch - smelling of my first year flat. I wondered what treasures I would gather in Mozambique, and what they would mean to me years later, if whatever it was would be on display in my house (wherever that may be) or if it would be in a box or a storage locker, waiting for me to finally settle for long enough to unpack.

COVID-19 and the national lockdown didn't give me a chance to find out. It did however lead to me living in Scottburgh in KZN, so at least I had another place to add to my list. It was there, where I had all the time in the world to mull over what it means to call a place home, that I began to feel like I didn't have one. I was a foreigner in Zimbabwe, but not quite a South African. I had experienced first hand the culture and the hustle and bustle of towns like Fish Hoek and Stellenbosch, but I had never myself been part of their noise. I had lived in many houses but put down no roots. That house - number twenty - would be no different. There would be no time to plant a garden because after all, though the world had stopped spinning there had to be an "after" and Scottburgh was only a "for now".

I used to love the idea of being a gypsy - it was a lifestyle in which growth could never be limited by stagnation and there was always the possibility of starting over somewhere new and magical - and what more is there to life than infinite possibility, right? However, amidst a global pandemic I felt trapped and confused about who I was and the correlation between my identity and where I was. That was around the time I (re) started writing my first novel. I would write every night into the early hours of the morning, completely immersed in the world I was creating. It was an escape from reality - the pandemic, economic decline, the uncertainty and it was an escape from my inner turmoil, from the part of me that did not belong anywhere.

It was only after a month or so of switching between my life and the lives of my characters, that I realized that I was feeling whole again. I was no longer pining after the life I could have lived in Zim, or the life I used to live in Cape Town. I wasn't worrying about the future, or trying to figure out where home would be. Instead I was creating worlds, living multiple lives at once, in multiple different places. I was experiencing new things from the comfort of the couch, and learning about myself through the thoughts and actions of my characters. I wasn't homeless. I had an abundance of homes, already there, safe and securely folded into the pages of my book and there were more waiting patiently to be discovered.

A home between the pages - it was a thought not quite grasped, but a concept that was being slowly unfurled within me. I found a sense of calm and I wondered whether that would still be there when I moved on to the next place. A few months later, I got the chance to find out. Move number twenty one - to Rietfontein, Pretoria. It's safe to say that I was terrified. What if I left that newfound peace behind? Luckily, I soon found out that it wasn't the case. The moment I sat down to write for the first time, in a new chair, in a new room with my manuscript open in front of me, I was safe. I was home.

Writing has taught me that a sense of belonging isn't something that time or a certain place brings, and home isn't necessarily a specific house. Instead, I've realized that belonging is a gift that only you can give yourself - an acceptance of all the parts that make up your whole - each memory, each influence, and each self-discovery. And home? Like the heartland I am building between the pages of my book, home is something that originates within you, and that you just have to be brave enough to create it for yourself.

Written by Georgia Rae