Home Away From Home

By Laura Gouveia

Edited by Matilde Mala

“É preciso sair da ilha para ver a ilha. Não nos vemos se não saímos de nós.”

Saramago

I don’t remember the first time I landed in Madeira. My bond with the island began when I was too little to even notice where I was.

Trauma, pain, anger. My relationship with my roots was never linear or easy. A lot of negativity was associated with that side of me so I tried to avoid it for a long time. Now I understand how you truly can’t escape yourself or where you come from. Whether you want it or not, that side of you will always come up. In this case, I’m extremely grateful it did.

I understand deeply how it can be helpful to write about it even when you know the person you’re addressing will never read it. To find peace within yourself and your identity. I was damaged by someone who wasn’t able to be present the way I needed. Life was unkind enough to make it impossible for my dad to be a positive influence on us. So I ignored his roots. It was his home, not mine. I didn’t have anything to do with the island.

However, Madeira won me over anyway. It was only in 2019 that I came to peace with my heritage, accepting that a part of me belongs to that bit of land surrounded by the immense sea. Surprisingly, not only did I make peace with that but I also became extremely fulfilled and found a missing piece of me there. Not a person, not a place, but more of an overall sense of belonging and completeness.

I came to the conclusion that I discovered (or accepted) my love for the island not long after I discovered my love for myself and life in general. After that, those two just kept on growing together and helping each other. When one of them was missing, the other was still present. Love blossomed inside of me like a beautiful strelitzia. Bright, strong and resistant to all adversities. Because of that, I feel a lot of calm and safety there. And, even though I’m far away for most of my life, I also find peace in knowing I can go there anytime. That the island awaits me and is always there, unchanged, when I want to go back.

There is something truly beautiful about having a home away from home. About feeling like you belong somewhere where you don’t exist daily. And I think that beauty is even more impactful when you feel that way towards an island. Writing these words I can feel the lukewarm breeze playing with my hair and smell the ocean, hear the waves and the birds. No other place has that same sea, color and lively atmosphere.

One of the last times I visited Madeira, I realized you can sometimes see the entirety of the island from the airplane a couple of minutes after taking off. Something clicked in me at that moment. There it was, almost like a postcard. The entirety of it. Home through a little plane window. It was like seeing a reflection, a continuity of myself. But then it gets lost amongst the ocean and clouds and you wonder when you’ll be back and find yourself again.