In nineteen seventy-seven, I was a long, long way from home. It feels like I’ve been a long way from home every since. It’s funny how often we refer to the place where our parents live, or where we were raised, as “home.”
As an aside, my wife and I were talking about a friend’s plans. She was flying to SoCal for her elementary school reunion. This astonished us. My wife was certain that if she went to a elementary school reunion, she wouldn’t recognize anyone except family. I agreed, I wouldn’t, either. My other problem was that I attended several elementary schools, because my family moved around America. Mom finally settled in Pittsburgh, and now calls that home. I lived there for about a while in my youth, so I call it home.
Anyway, this Foreigner song came out in nineteen seventy-seven. Twenty-one years old, I was in the Philippines, ending a military assignment, and heading for Texas, for my next assignment. I was going by way of Pennsylvania and West Virginia to pick up my wife. The song, “A Long, Long Way from Home,” starts out with its second line, “I left a small town for the apple in decay,” a reference to moving to New York. The song is subsequently about feeling lonely and being far from home. And although it was my choice, I often felt the same as I traveled the world, even while enjoying myself and seeing historic sights.