This used to be my father's bedside table. My mom decided it would be better as an end table, and moved it next to our couch. She did not consult my father beforehand. (!!!)
Dad was pretty indignant about it. Eventually he said in a mournful tone, "I need time to get used to changes in my environment." Here's the replacement that my mother installed:
The mysterious machine with the tubes is a CPAP mask for his sleep apnea.
My father's comment got me thinking. Homefeel definitely requires a certain sameness, an endurance of expected arrangements and experiences. It's not that a home can't be dynamic, but it has to have continuing principles, especially sensory ones. The smell of cookies baking is a classic one. Nostalgia doesn't develop without loss--the childhood bedroom emptied out, or turned into a craft studio--and the homefeel that must precede nostalgia can't develop without visceral percolation. I wouldn't love my routines if I didn't feel the history of them stretching behind me, didn't worry that my imprint was fading. (Mixed metaphors, alas.)
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Thank you for sharing your thoughts.