“I’m sorry, but I need to go find my home” I said to the townspeople. I am Jack. A few years ago, I was camping with my family in the Appalachian Mountains when I got lost. I spent months wandering around the woods when I finally came to a small town named Silverton. It was built as a port on Lake Superior in Michigan. It was a beautiful place. It was always a nice, cool temperature, the people were always nice, and there was an island in the middle of the harbor that was just covered with beautiful pine trees. The way the sun hit the clouds there made the sky shine in the light. Over the years there, I lost my memory of my last name, and where I lived. But Silverton was the answer because there, the people didn’t care what my name was; they just liked me for who I was. It was the best place I could ever dream of. Then one day, I decided I wanted to find the place that was my home.


I conducted research on the Appalachian Mountains and I figured out that my parents had put up posters of me with “Lost” on top of each of them. I called the number that the poster had listed. “Hello”, came a voice of the women on the other end, “Hello, my name is Jack. I would like to know if you are my mother.” “Excuse me, but I only have one son and he is in college. The people who lived in this house before me lost a child while they were camping.” “I believe that I am their lost son” “Oh my, I am so sorry but, they moved far away to California. I wish that I had kept their phone number but I’m afraid I don’t.” “ Oh well, do you remember their last name?” “Yes, it was Steele.” “Thank you so much, I have to go now so, bye.” That lady was the single most important part of my journey, even though it wouldn’t end that well for me.


I managed to compile a list of all the families with the name of Steele in the United States. I started my cross-country journey that would end a year later. I searched until I came across a family who lived in Chicago. They had told me that they are in the same family as my parents. They met at a family reunion twelve years ago. They were upset that they had lost their child. But the man told me that for some reason, they weren’t too upset and they had given up searching for me after only two days. He told me the last time he saw them twelve years ago, they lived in a small town in New York called Buffalo. That would be where my journey ended, and my eyes were finally opened.


I felt so happy as I went to the address where my family lived. I closed my eyes as I came to the gates of the front yard. I opened my eyes, and my heart sank. The house, looked like it had been abandoned for years. There was a construction notice on the gates that read, “Warning, this building has been condemned unsafe. Enter at your own risk. Issued by the National Council of Construction and Demolition.” I just sat there until day turned to dusk. I stared at the moon, and for some reason, something seemed to happen. My eyes became open. I realized that this place I thought was home, really wasn’t. I saw that I had had a home all along, I just couldn’t see it. So, I went back to Silverton. The beautiful place where everyone smiled. The place where the sky shined in the light. The place with the towering pine trees. The place with the most beautiful lake ever. The place that I now knew was my home, and I called it home.