Send a Piece of Home Ahead of Them

“Open when you're homesick”

The front door still sticks. The kettle still takes forever. Someone still leaves the good mug in the sink instead of the dishwasher, and I'm not naming names. I'm telling you the boring things because I know what you actually miss isn't us saying we love you — it's the ordinary noise of a place you know by heart. All of it is still here, exactly as annoying as when you left. It will still be here at Christmas, and next summer, and whenever else you want it. Go and be somewhere new for a while. Home is not a thing you can lose.

— The door sticks, the light's on.

“Open when everyone else seems to have settled in”

They haven't. I promise you they haven't. Everyone is doing the same performance of being fine in a new place, and about half of them are reading a letter like this one tonight. Settling in isn't a race and it isn't a personality test — it takes some people a fortnight and some people a term, and the ones it takes longer for usually end up with the better friends.

“Open when you're thinking of coming back early”

If you need to come home, come home. That's the first thing, and I mean it without conditions. But if it's a hard week rather than a wrong decision, give it one more fortnight before you decide — hard weeks lie, and they always lie in the same direction. Ring me either way. I'd rather have the phone call at a stupid hour than have you make this decision alone.

— Whatever you choose, it's not a failure.

“Open when you miss the dog”

She's fine. She sat by the door for about four days, which I'm told is normal and which I found completely unbearable. Now she's taken over your bed entirely and has no visible regrets. I send this less as an update and more as proof that the house you left is carrying on being the house you left — badly, warmly, with too much fur on everything.