To not understand what a "homebird" is excited by?

[BooYah]

My childhood was complicated, difficult and transitory. We moved a lot. As an adult, am bored easily, and have moved many times, including to other countries. I find it really exciting.

We are moving again soon. Lots of people have said, when told about the news that we re moving, "oh, I'm such a homebird, I wouldn't want to move away". That is, of course fine. My way isn't for everyone, I get that. But what I don't really understand is what excites other people.

I then started thinking how I could replicate those feelings if I couldn't move somewhere new, and I wondered if perhaps extreme sports would replace it? But for people who don't want either, how do you get the same thrill?

If you are a 'homebird', what excites you?

I was raised a bit like your kids seem to be being raised. We never stayed in one country long. I went to ‘good schools’. Dozens of them. I unpacked my belongings in dozens of bedrooms. I have no old friends - none of those people who’ve known you forever and know you inside and out, as I was never in one place long enough to make any.

I don’t want that for my son - we might move to a bigger house but we will stay in this area until he finishes school. We’ll take him to plenty of different places and he will be well travelled, but this corner of the world will be a permanent home.

Reanimated - or they’re introverts.

Nothing wrong with my IQ, but I find people wear me out and worry me so at the end of the day I’m ready to be alone, be at home, watch tv, read a book. Needing to be excited doesn’t mean you’re clever or not clever. There’s no link there. Unless books are banned, and I’ll never be bored.

I noticed that my children actually stopped bothering to make friends. Like they said what's the point? My DH who moved a lot, being in a military family, was similar. He doesn't do friends at all. Like none. Just family.

(Nothing wrong with my IQ, but I find people wear me out and worry me so at the end of the day I’m ready to be alone, be at home, watch tv, read a book*

The latest research suggests your type of behaviour is associated with a higher IQ, actually.

People wear me out too- ( IQ of 152 ) I am an introvert, but have no problem interacting in social situations.
I am not at all shy, in fact a lot of my career has been in sales/marketing, involving constant communication.
Interacting socially leaves me like a dead husk- totally exhausted.
I have a job now working alone at home which I love.

I've travelled a bit and lived in two different countries, but I tend to settle in homes and workplaces. I don't feel the need to move or even change decorations. I prefer long term friends to constantly meeting new people.

However, I do get mental stimulation from different areas and will seek information. I love science, but also enjoy history, politics, linguistics, etc and look forward to learning at least a bit from different fields. That's where I get my excitement from.

Occasionally I'll try a different supermarket but that really is the limit of thrill seeking for me.

That's interesting Headofthehive I moved a lot as a child and I just realised that I still don't bother to make friends.

We used to move often when I was a kid, I had to change school in middle of the year so many times I never really made any friends. But it made me an expert at assembling furniture.

Now I still live in the first house I got after leaving my parents. It's small and not that great, but it's my home. Year after year I make it more so, modifying furniture or building them from scratch to fit both the house and my needs perfectly. My pride and satisfaction after finishing one of my little projects are plenty enough for me.

In all that time I went on holiday away (in another city, not another country) twice, for less than three days. It was fun and interesting, but I enjoy spending my holidays reading a good series of book so much more. My family goes abroad quite often and has a hard time understanding that I'm perfectly fine like this. And like some previous posters, I tend to wear my favourite clothes until they are not physically wearable anymore...

Some day I will move to another house, and will do so with a lot of joy and excitement; but I will do it once, then I'll start building a new nest for the following years.

what I struggle to understand is people who are Middle aged and still in the town/village/city they were born in and have never ever lived anywhere else. How do you know how great the place you live is if you’ve never experienced anywhere else?

Sounds bliss and far preferable to not really belonging anywhere

If Im in one of my childhood homes Im always a bit home sick for another. Im never fully "home" anywhere. My "people" are spread all over the world. Its not exciting its sad and at times mentally exhausting. Always feeling a pull elsewhere but knowing that thats not home either. You dont really belong anywhere.

People who "get" the value of roots early on (before it starts to matter) and stay put and solidify their network are the smart ones IMO. Although I probably viewed them as "boring" in my early 20s.

I'm a home bird and an introvert.

I don't like change, surprises, travel or meeting new people. I like a quiet life, mainly at home with my husband and dog

I live about a mile from where I grew up (I have lived elsewhere for work but was more than happy to come back)

I'm a bit scared of having to be more social when my baby is born, it's just not my thing, I like being alone and the thought of play dates and baby groups sounds awful!

I don't really have many friends or hobbies and I like it that way

This is interesting and something me and a good friend have discussed over the years!
We both felt unsettled and both moved abroad etc. We craved something...the excitement. Not sure what.
Then I was talking to my sister one day, who is a proper home bird. And she just simply said she is content. Content with her life. It just seemed to hit me! I really envied her after that point. Me and my friend never felt content. And it seemed to me we had something lacking in our lives! We were chasing something. I think we both thought in a way, it's something that 'interesting' people did.
Now, me and my friend are both settled back in the UK, and can probably class ourselves as content. Which is an amazing place to be.

I have very good friends, and lots of them.

I think this would be part of the problem for me as the two parts of that sentence just don’t compute for me (well not unless you make it your life’s work keeping up with them). I have very close relationships with only a few friends and family and in the main I have known them for many years. I like to see them in person & interact with them face to face, I’m not even that fond of speaking to them on the phone. I know their parents & their children and can try to give concrete help if they are having problems, as they would with me.
I love visiting other places and do that a lot but I like to have a base to return to.
I also like to achieve things in the activities I do and get excitement from that.
I remember listening to a radio programme once about people who just decided to go and live in a new place that they had no connection with and where they knew nobody. My brain just couldn’t deal with why anyone would choose to do this.

*I love making my home perfect for me. I love having a place for everything and everything in it's place.

I love the view from my windows. The smell of my home when I walk in the door. I'm excitedly when the bulbs I planted in the autumn push through the soil to herald spring.

I'm excited when unusual birds land on my bird table! It takes my breath away.

I'm excited by the changing seasons. But also I prefer routine and marking time in other ways to changing my envoironment. I have a strong pull to be 'Home'. Tea and hot cross buns in the afternoon with my husband watching sport while I read a magazine and sprawl across him. My cats and the plants I have grown and the roots I have put down.

I wish I had the urge to travel and have adventures! By my heart is in my home, the repetition and the familiar. smile*

^ that has made my heart warm. The little things mean a lot.
Nearly Easter, so won’t be long before the hot cross buns are on sale @brownmouse.

*should have been in bold.

Travel with the military is a totally different kettle of fish (as is a lot of ex-pat stuff). You are essentially just deposited into a different community, but the type of people, events, and activities are the same whether you are in Dubai, Ascension or Aldershot. You are surrounded by an instant friendship group (if you choose to seek them out) and your kids are never the only ones moving in or out. It's all stillness fairly transitory. You can make deep friendships for short periods, but then you move on to the next lot of 'all in the same boat' people.
I lost count of the number of settings that dc1 attended. Once we left and chose where to settle, our intention that was they would finally be able to make and keep friendships. Dc3 is disabled. Even in transitory places it is much harder for an obviously different child to integrate into friendship groups. Moving was essentially condemning them to be the unknown weirdo for life. At least in a stable environment there is the chance for people to see the worth beyond the difference.
I agree that at some point lots of people don't bother to maintain external friendships if they are on this Ferris wheel - the tension between enveloping yourself in a community just to leave it (essentially by the time you are fully involved, you are already planning to leave) and deciding to just stay at home and concentrate on the people moving with you is palpable.
Once your kids get to exam age it's another thing altogether. Do you commit to a country? Or continue to globe hop, realizing that you may well have three children in universities across the world, with you in a different country? Who can even afford that sort of shite? Three lots of international student fees and airfares for Christmas? Where do you even put them in the holidays?
Eventually you have to realise that it's not sustainable and put the brakes on. Or one family member decides they can't face the boredom and continues to jaunt, while parking the other one with the kids in the Home Counties, usually resulting in divorce anyway. Ho hum.
Unless you have an unlimited budget, depositing your not quite yet grown kids around the globe while you continue to live out your fantasy doesn't work. If you've found out how it does, do let me in on the secret...

You don't really need to understand or know what homebirds get excited about, you just need to get on with enjoying your own life.

I'm an extrovert and I love staying at home. I've lived abroad before and it made me see how much I love living where I belong. I hated being the outsider!

Most importantly, now, I want my children to feel they belong somewhere. To feel rooted and settled, so even if they do grow up and travel/move abroad, they have somewhere they can come 'back' to, if they want or need it. I love the way they know so many people within a mile of our front door. They know the shopkeepers and the local characters, and have happy memories of this park or that stretch of the river.

I have a few friends who are serial expats and do wonder about them. Is it all about being able to afford a maid, and endless brunches, and nannies? Is it about saving a tax-free salary for a future life of ease? Or are they running away from something?

BlueMazdaBlueHonda I am with you.

I find the simplest of pleasures the most pleasurable.
The pushing up of spring flowers, the smell of baking bread, the refreshing splash of fresh water.

And my life has been varied and full, I have flown the world, lived and partied in far flung places. But come back to simlicity.

This thread is having a weird effect on me. I moved into the last place 2 years ago and now i feel claustrophobic and want to leave. I havsnt felt this since last year.

I moved home 12 times in the first 10 years of my life. As as adult I actively avoid any sort of disturbance or upheaval.

My excitement is travelling with DH and the DCs then coming home to our lovely house where we've put down so many roots that it's impossible to even begin to untangle them. The DCs have grown up in this house, they've been to nursery and school with friends they've known since babyhood, we have friends and family nearby to share parties, bbqs, takeaways and nights out, we have our jobs which we both love. We have pets they've grown up with and loved, I have my very own pet dog who adores me in that way only a dog can.

Growing up in foster care is hard, but the absolute hardest part of any of it for me was the fact that I have nothing from 'before'. I don't know what my first word was, what I weighed when I was born, when I walked, who I ran to when I was hurt, not a single detail.

Giving my own DC those details excites me every single day. To have had the pleasure of watching them grow up in a home and family the polar opposite of my own excites me more than I can say because when I watch them play, laugh and cry I know for sure I've broken that cycle and can't imagine anything more soothing for my soul. Excitement doesn't have to be covered in glitter and change. It can be the calm, quiet steadiness of a life full of love.

I'm a bit like you, OP. Have always loved to travel. I have moved around countries a bit and part of me would like to again; but I've settled down massively since I met DP. Home feels like home now; I can be very happy just in with him.

That said, if he was up for spending some time aboard, I would be. Even when we've had DC; pre school years. I think it'd be a great way for them to learn languages and experience different cultures.

DH and I are easily bored and need an exciting lifestyle yet are homebirds. While once upon a time this area was perfect for us, since outgrowing this lifestyle and realising what we want out of life. And it involves leaving the UK.

I have come to the conclusion that in order to feel settled you need to like the area / country you’re living in and the area needs to offer or be close to the activities / type of people ( similar mindset) and provide the things needed to achieve certain goals you may have.