I live in Beverly Hills and I'm proud of it. The only things I

Hear the voice of Steve Jones, once the rebel of punk, who spoke with honesty of his journey across oceans: “I live in Beverly Hills and I’m proud of it. The only things I miss are pie and mash shops and football games. I’ve lived in America longer than I lived in England. When I first got here, it just felt right to me. I like the open space, and the weather’s great.” Though spoken with simplicity, these words carry the timeless weight of exile and belonging, of leaving one land and embracing another, of the eternal search for a place where the soul may rest.

For what is it to leave the land of one’s birth? It is both loss and discovery. In England, Jones was formed—there he tasted the rough bread of youth, the sound of rebellion, the music that gave voice to a restless generation. Yet he crossed the sea, and in America he found a new rhythm, a new home. His words carry the ancient tension: the heart that remembers the food and games of its homeland, yet finds peace in a new world where the sun and sky offer freedom.

The ancients knew this feeling well. Consider Aeneas, hero of Troy. His city burned, his homeland lost, yet he carried with him the memory of his people as he journeyed across seas to found a new life in Italy. Like Jones, he bore within him both longing and pride: longing for the hearth of his youth, pride in the land he would call his own. Such is the dual inheritance of all who cross borders—two nations, two loves, two homes.

Jones’s mention of pie and mash shops and football games is no small thing. These are symbols of belonging, of the ordinary joys that tie man to the soil of his youth. To miss them is to remember one’s roots; to cherish them is to keep alive the memory of where one began. Yet his embrace of open space and sunlight in America shows that the heart can expand, holding both past and present without contradiction. This is not betrayal of origin, but fulfillment of destiny.

So too, many who journey far from home feel this paradox. The Irish who crossed the Atlantic carried their songs and their dances, yet built new lives in New York and Boston. The Japanese who settled on distant shores planted cherry trees as reminders of what they left behind. Always there is the echo of the old world, but also the embrace of the new. Jones speaks not only for himself, but for every soul who has ever stood between two homelands, weaving memory with discovery.

The lesson is this: do not fear to outgrow the land of your birth. To love a new home does not mean to forget the old; to cherish the present does not mean to betray the past. Life is a river, and it may carry you far from your first village, yet the waters of memory will always flow with you. Be proud of where you are, honor where you came from, and allow your spirit to hold both without shame.

Therefore, in your own life, seize the gifts of place. If you live where you were born, cherish its familiar soil. If you have traveled far, embrace the blessings of your new ground. Let nostalgia be a sweetness, not a chain. Let pride in your present be a song, not a denial. Fill your life with gratitude for both the roots that ground you and the wings that carried you elsewhere. For in the end, home is not one place alone, but wherever the soul finds rest and joy.

So let Steve Jones’s words be remembered not merely as a casual remark, but as a teaching: that a man may miss the football games of his past and yet rejoice in the open space of his present. That life is not about choosing between worlds, but about carrying them both within, like twin fires lighting the path ahead. This is the wisdom of exile, the strength of belonging, and the gift of a heart that finds home in many places.