Home is the dive bar in an alien city

Finding connection on unknown ground is golden; I found mine in America’s dive bars

I remember three things about that summer – the travel, the heat and the isolation.

The August heat bounced off concrete. Overheated phone in hand. Useless. Stranded in Texas. Tired from days of meetings with people who didn’t want to see me. 

Summer was almost over, and I’d spent it acquiring alien products in strange boardrooms. A walking, blazing, sign of change packaged as a 25-year-old with a strange accent – a  Russian doll with a shiny veneer and insides cobbled with tape. 

Thousands of miles from home. But that didn’t cause the isolation. Because home comforts aren’t decided– they’re felt. And I knew just the place to find it.

There’s something special about visiting a new place thousands of miles away and finding a slice of home. I’ve heard something similar about the church. It’s in the familiarity. The comfort of service, gospel verses, hymns and a united belief in one religion. The tribe. 

The cliche says that community is dead—but it’s out there; you just have to know where to look. So, I went looking. Five thousand miles from home, under the Texan sun.

The day before, someone had mentioned Deep Ellum—an arts district packed with music, galleries, and tattoo shops. I had to see it.

As I made my way in, head heavy from the past few weeks, the Bomb Factory loombed. Bang. A massive billboard loomed to my right. Boom. Plastered with the type of logos that people would cross the street to avoid. I was home. 

In the heart of the street, 80s rock spilled, wrapping itself around me. Snaking past the bars and studios, into the balmy air. This was it. I grabbed a bench out back and started to regain power. 

Wanted: logos you’d walk across the street to avoid

I realised I could replicate this feeling whenever and wherever I needed it. So that’s what I did. I found a sense of home in my own world of certainty whenever things felt uneasy. I’d discovered a perfect antidote to corporate America, and I loved it.

In Atlanta, my home was the Elucid Avenue Yacht Club in Little Five Points. Wooden paneling and kitsch ornaments on the walls—a welcome escape from the corporate offices and hotels, where everything matched too well. Those office buildings all looked and smelled the same—grey carpet tiles underfoot, tall mahogany desks at the entrance, and a faint scent that brought me right back to primary school in the ’90s. I liked it, but it wasn’t home.

But I knew where to go.

If I found myself in town on the weekend, I’d hop on the subway to Little Five Points for a taste of comfort. I made friends.The local Slow Bicycle Club gathered at the club every Saturday—a group of older guys, each taking their time on a weekly tour of the city. 

One of them leaned across the bar to say: “See that guy over there? Does really well for himself. You wouldn’t think it, would you?” I was included. There was a mix of humor and sincerity in his voice that pulled me right into the fold. This was a community built on small talk and shared laughter, where status and background didn’t matter. It was understood without words—this place was their home, and, for a while, it was mine too.

Home doesn’t have to be forever. 

Take a seat: Elucid Avenue Yacht Club window

Some places I’d stumble upon just once; they’d serve a purpose in that moment, I’d thank them for their survive and be on my way. And then there were others that became true homes-away-from-home.

At the heart of it, humans crave routine and comfort. We find solace in the feel of an old scarf, the taste of a childhood meal. In the cracks of an online community, a favorite song, or style of art.

I often think about what made those places work for me. It wasn’t just the décor or the music or the reminder of friends back home. It was the way all these pieces came together to create a feeling—a fleeting but unmistakable sense of normality. It was the conversations that flowed, the laughter over shared stories, and the simple, grounding feeling that, for a moment, I was exactly where I needed to be.

Because home isn't just a place, or a country. 

It’s the convergence of moments when we feel understood, seen, and accepted. 

It’s the places that offer refuge from the chaos outside. 

It’s the act of being.

Because home comforts aren’t decided– they’re felt.