Refried Neurons

I recently watched two films that circled around the same idea:
the person you love is your home.

Both shook something inside me — but in completely different ways.

The Salt Path tells the story of a couple who lose their home and, while walking, slowly realise that their real home is actually each other. No matter where they are, they are “home” as long as they are together.

The second film — People We Meet on Vacation — tells a very different story. Two young people meet, travel together for years, and slowly fall in love. One of them lives for movement, unpredictability and constant travel. The other dreams of stability, routine and roots. For years, they fail to make their relationship work — not because they don’t care, but because they believe they want completely different lives. In reality, neither of them truly knows what they want. What they both long for is not one lifestyle or the other, but a way to merge their worlds — to build something that feels like home to both of them.

And in the end, just like in The Salt Path, they arrive at the same realisation:
that no matter where they go, and no matter what happens to them,
home is the person they love.

The Salt Path lifted my spirits — it reminded me that humans are resilient, that people can go through unimaginable things and still keep walking forward. But it also left me deeply unsettled.

Not because of the idea of homelessness —
but because of the idea of being alone when it happens.

What shocked me most was that the couple seemed to have no one else to turn to. No family. No friends. No wider network. That felt almost unimaginable to me. If I sat down for five minutes, I could easily name ten people who would help me — some of them probably even if I had committed a crime.

And that made me wonder:

Am I just incredibly lucky?
Am I detached from the reality of most people?
Do I only think I have those people around me — but if something truly went wrong, no one would actually show up?

Or is it cultural?
Is it because I was raised in a place where you are taught from childhood that you do not abandon your family and friends in need? That you show up, even when it is uncomfortable?

And if so… is this changing?

What truly disturbed me about both films wasn’t the fear of losing a home.

It was the thought that without friends and family, we are painfully alone.

And real relationships require time, presence and emotional effort. But we seem to be quietly building lives that make that harder.

We spend more evenings on Netflix.
More hours scrolling.
More energy on work.

And somehow, we have less and less left for the people who matter most.

I used to think adulthood made social life harder — until I remembered my first years in London. I worked just as much as I do now, and still somehow managed to meet friends three or four times a week.

Nothing external really changed.
I did.

I’m not twenty-seven anymore — but I’m not old either. And yet, after work, I often choose the sofa instead of the effort of going out.

I tell myself it’s about health — and in a way, it probably is. Eating at home is healthier, but more isolating. Drinking less is healthier, but removes many casual social rituals. Going to the gym is healthy, but replaces long evenings of sitting and talking.

Even wellness can quietly make us lonelier.

There is also something else quietly happening to us.

We are replacing the dopamine we used to get from being with people with the dopamine we now get from buying things.

A package arriving.
A new outfit.
New gear.
New furniture.
Another trip planned.

Small hits of excitement that feel good in the moment — but don’t actually hold us when life becomes heavy.

And the more we replace connection with consumption, the more money we need to sustain it.
So we work more.
We scroll more.
We plan more.
We get more tired.

And the more tired we are, the easier it becomes to choose the sofa over a friend, convenience over conversation, delivery over dinner.

It becomes a quiet loop:

Less connection → more consumption → more work → more tiredness → even less connection.

Until one day, we look around and realise we are efficient, busy, productive…
but somehow, a little alone.

For a long time, I believed deeply in the nomad dream.

For the last two years, I have lived between Poland and the UK, constantly travelling, constantly half-packed, constantly somewhere else. At first, it was exhilarating. I hate boredom, and novelty was everywhere. Something new almost every day.

But over time, something shifted.

I began to miss my things.
My routines.
My slow mornings.
My partner.
My friends.

My relationships slowly became weaker — more distant — simply because I was never really there.

And I started to wonder:

Are people who stay — who build a community, who cherish their routines and relationships — actually happier?

Or is it just the life that social media keeps placing in front of us that makes us believe the nomad path is the only happy one?

Maybe it’s just my feed — carefully adjusted to what I once wanted to believe. Because there are other feeds too. Ones that quietly celebrate steady lives, gardens, family dinners, slow mornings, big tables and full living rooms. They just haven’t been on my wall — yet.

And yet, I catch myself dreaming about refurbishing a small cottage. About having a garden. A big table. A living room that finally has enough space — and time — for dinners with friends and family.

So maybe, as always, it isn’t about freedom versus stability.

Maybe it’s about balance.

From time to time, we talk about moving back to Poland. And the reason is always the same: we want to spend more time with family and friends.

But then reality quietly interrupts the dream — because nothing actually guarantees that we would spend more time together than we do now.

Maybe when we visit, everything feels more intense because it’s “now or never.”
But once we lived next door, that pressure might disappear.
We might slowly become… exactly where we are now.

Too busy.
Too tired.
Too distracted.
Flying. Scrolling. Watching. Working.

Seeing even our closest people — even the ones next door — once every two months.