Here’s one way to do it, with a glob:

print "Which directory? (Default is your home directory) ";
chomp(my $dir = <STDIN>);
if ($dir =~ /\A\s*\Z/) {         # A blank line
  chdir or die "Can't chdir to your home directory: $!";
} else {
  chdir $dir or die "Can't chdir to '$dir': $!";
}

my @files = <*>;
foreach (@files) {
  print "$_\n";
}

First, we show a simple prompt, and read the desired directory, chomping it as needed. (Without a chomp, we’d be trying to head for a directory that ends in a newline—legal in Unix, and therefore cannot be presumed to simply be extraneous by the chdir function.)

Then, if the directory name is nonempty, we’ll change to that directory, aborting on a failure. If empty, the home directory is selected instead.