I recently returned to Honduras after spending two weeks visiting family and friends in Chicago. It had been about six months since I was last home, and it was good to see my parents and my brother, and I also had the chance to catch up with some close friends. During this time at home several people asked me the same question, "What do you miss?"
I found myself repeating the same answer, which is, "not much, really." On occasions I miss certain foods (melted cheese comes to mind), and I do miss particular people. But, I have settled into a somewhat simpler and somewhat slower life with a number of smart, dedicated, and fun people around me. Moreover, I get to do meaningful work with a great deal of freedom. The environment here can be hard emotionally, things often don't go as planned, and sometimes they are just bad (more so at the moment than in the past, but that's a topic for a different time). Despite all that, I am generally happy. Most importantly perhaps, I seem to have discovered that I don't need as much as I once thought I did to be happy.
So, to finally get back to answering the original question, the one thing I do miss is a certain ease, or a shared set of expectations for a given situation. But ultimately I came here, at least partially, because I was tired of being comfortable.
