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Many students return home for the holidays not to the comfort of an untouched version of their high school bedroom, but to a construction zone transformed into their parents' latest project.
The workout room that dad will never work out in or a storage unit for the mounds of mom's scrapbooking supplies occupy the space students spent their youth in.
But regardless if students are returning this Thanksgiving break to the same mundane routine they wanted to leave behind or can't wait to get back, most find it hard to balance hometown emotions.
Freshman year, after catching the first available flight home, I found myself sleeping not in my cozy old haven, but in my father's new Dallas Cowboys' room.
Yep, I was forced to sleep under the blue and silver stars that stalked the walls of the room I once decorated myself.
And my mother's house was not better. My former domain was the heart of her and her friends' entertainment - a movie room.
Much like worn-out socks with holes, homecomings after starting college may be comfortable, but just don't fit like they used to.
Chico becomes second home
For senior Maurice Glasgow, home is a stable foundation he can run back to, he said.
"It's a weird sense of comfort," he said. "That's an established home from roots, but you feel like you've made a home somewhere else."
Getting settled in is difficult, knowing he is just there for a visit, he said. But home is symbolic and it is something that never changes.
"Security is my grandparent's house because no matter what, where I go, how old I get, I always feel like that's my No. 1 home," he said.
Being from Los Angeles, it's hard at times for Glasgow to feel connected to his Southern Californian roots, he said. But people get used to Chico's ways and it becomes its own freedom.
While Chico doesn't possess all the comforts of home, it works for Glasgow because living far away forces him to establish his own home, he said.
"As much as you do miss home, you will grow an appreciation for Chico, and you'll accept Chico as your second home," he said. "That's normal."
Homesickness too much
For students such as junior Brianna Ellis, the pressures of leaving home can be too much, she said.
"Symbolically, it is where I can be me," she said.
Ellis left Chico to attend San Diego State her freshman year only to return a year later because the home she knew for so long was too far away, she said.
But what she missed wasn't just coming home to her old room, she said.
"My parents' house, where I grew up, is a physical home, but home is not limited only to that one place," she said.
What Ellis missed was Chico itself, she said.
Chico shortcomings
For students such as sophomore Jayme Jones, Chico doesn't fit the criteria to make a home, she said.
Jones doesn't see that changing, she said.
Being from Oakland, Jones finds going home easy and takes advantage of it regularly, she said. On the weekends she doesn't work, she seizes the opportunity to spend time outside Chico's bubble.
"Home is … where your roots are, where you grew up, you know, where everything is familiar," she said.
Jones often works to find a balance between Chico and her Oakland roots, she said. Like many students, she struggles with changes to her home in the months she's been away.
"I've outgrown it. It's not really the same anyway," she said. "Nothing stays constant from your past, but the home I know isn't what it used to be."
Sasha Knox can be reached at sknox@theorion.com
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