“I don't think I have a home anymore,” says forty-four-year-old Mini Sharma Ogle who lives in Portland, Oregon with her two young children, husband, and parents.

He waves his wand and shouts expelliarmus from the top of the stairs as I walk in. I hear a crash as a book goes flying from his mom’s hand through the air. “Mom, be nice to the books!” he reminds her with a tone of excited authority – ironic coming from an eight-year-old to his author mom.

“Woah!” I exclaim with mock amazement.

Our goal of going down to Dawson Park was to ask a wide variety of visitors about this park. We asked them, “What does this park mean to you? What memories do you have of this park? What do you think about calling parts of this park ‘kid-friendly’ and ‘sketchy’?”

“It used to be that when I lived in Illinois, I would return to Spain to visit my family. I told my friends there I was ‘going home.’ Spain was my home. Once I moved to Portland and bought a house, this city became our home. Now, I visit my family in Murcia, but I do not ‘go home’.”

“It was mostly an accident,” says George Crandall, thinking back to his early days.

On a rainy Wednesday afternoon, I interviewed Crandall, a wise older gentleman with round glasses and wispy gray hair.

“Where are you from?”

It’s a question that can hold more significance than we often realize.

For some, the answer is as simple as naming a city. For others, there may be more than one answer or no clear answer at all.

Many people know Peggy Schauffler simply as the Lower School Art Teacher who is soft spoken, who enjoys being out in nature with her students and finding the best creative outlets for them, and who almost exclusively wears stunning blues and greens. For me, she has been all of those things and also my long time friend.