Can Home Be a Park Bench?

The man who “lives” at the corner of Windermere and Bloor streets in Toronto falls into a demographic category labeled “homeless.” Occasionally I see him there, sitting or sleeping. When awake he appears to be immersed in thought, occasionally glancing at passers-by, though he makes little or no contact with them. In the very public sphere of the bench, he appears to make the space private by focusing inward, disconnecting from his surroundings. As far as I can see, he invites no one in. Sometimes his neatly stacked and tarp-covered worldly goods sit alone on the bench, a reminder to his neighbors that he will return. Remarkably, it seems the residents and passers-by in this relatively affluent neighborhood of this large cosmopolitan city do not tamper with his belongings.

I think of the man because he challenges assumptions about the meaning of home, for surely the bench is home to him. He has done what we all do with varying degrees of complexity—created a tangible representation of a deep inner need to feel attached. In his article, Peter Petschauer speaks about attachment in relation to our concept of home. It seems we all are compelled to express our attachment needs in concrete ways so that through our interactions with our created or claimed space we reassure ourselves that we do, indeed, belong somewhere. This phenomenon is particularly striking in photographs of flooded areas, in which people cling to rooftops or return in boats to paddle around their houses, awaiting the moment they can return to reestablish their physical homes. It is as if they are literally lost without them. We need physical places to return to, even if they are moveable. Home may be a vehicle, an army barracks, or a tent. A client who was raised in the military and then joined the service as a teen says home is where he takes off his boots and stores his tools. Permanency is not what makes a place home to him.

Home is a physical space but it is also a deep feeling of connection that we both carry inside us and express tangibly. Home is a mutual give and take: it gives to us and we “put into” it, as Petschauer notes in his mention of creating a home from ruin. We create a space and it gives back comfort and shelter, a place to be private or to share, a place to store the things we accumulate and treasure.

My guess is that people who own several houses in different countries feel one of them is home, the one which best expresses attachment, the one into which the owner has put more effort and feeling or that has been the site of a significant event, the one last sold in the event of a financial meltdown. Petschauer mentioned the “trophy house” which is not really a home. The apparent ease with which it changes hands would seem to confirm his point. Perhaps for these owners the sense of home has been lost. Or perhaps home is represented to them in some other place or way, in a person, for example, rather than a building. Since moving through the world can be hazardous, the owners of several homes in different parts of the world may be expressing their comfort in the larger world. Of course, if we all had the financial capability we might all express this sentiment.

Petschauer mentioned the “homesickness” people feel when they are away from their homes but, without laboring the medical connection, home can also be the site of sickness. His idea of home as safe haven is a romanticized one. For many people safety at home is more illusion than reality. Millions of people who are trapped in their homes through dependency or who have been abused there know home is no safe place. We must be careful in our interpretations of home for those who have been abused or experienced other trauma in the buildings in which they live.

Because home is a concrete expression of our attachment needs, it is visible to others and when people see our homes their impressions of us may change. We look at the man on the park bench and call him “homeless.” He may view and name his situation quite differently.

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