I understand home not as a place, but as a pizza. While moving around three cities in the last 14 months (Brussels, Vienna and now Copenhagen), home can’t be a place, it can’t be a room. They change too often. Their offer of permanence and security is about as staged as the IKEA furniture that seems to have cloned itself to decorate each of my rented abodes. So when I feel overwhelmed, which is fairly often, home involves carving a little time for a romantic evening for two: Dr. Oetker and I. I know there are superior pizzas, but somehow the doctor’s Pizza Hawaii has become my refuge. Always affordable (3 euros at the Carrefour Express in Brussels, 3.79 at Billa in Vienna, 25-18 DKK in Copenhagen) and always average, Pizza Hawaii is consumed in one sitting, accompanied by mayonnaise.

I want to say that home looks like my running destinations, like Bois de la Cambre in Brussels, Schönbrunn in Vienna or The Lakes in Copenhagen, but I can only find refuge and relief in those places when I can muster up the energy to leave the house. At the end of a long day, when I want to scurry into solitude and take a break from representing myself, Dr. Oetker is my home. When I think about feeling at home, I think about feeling full, warm, and happy (remnants of a very blessed childhood). A plate of average pizza, eaten in bed while watching the US Office, seems to provide that feeling. I can’t explain it, and I’m not necessarily proud to admit it, but my home is a pizza.