Going back home

After the worship service and burial of Mama's ashes and the visiting with family and friends, some we haven't seen in years . . . after a glass of wine and laughing on the porch until midnight, after coffee & left over fruit and cake for breakfast, and one last trip to the church to make sure everything was back in order . . . then, it was time to go home. The weekend was everything I hoped for - the service was beautiful, the church was full of people who love Mama, the weather was just right. Yes, it was hot in the church but services at St. Barnabas are always hot in June! I felt loved and open to being loved. I felt honored and blessed by my life, by my family, by my community. I felt whole and healed. I felt joy.

Then it was time to go home. Our stuff was packed and in the truck. Everyone got their hugs; some got two. I stood on the front steps of my grandaddy's old house, built in 1917, and looked at the Japanese Maple in the front yard that reaches above the first floor roofline (I remember when Grand planted it). And, it was time to go home.

My chest suddenly felt tight and my feet heavy. I felt a little confused about what home is. Home is the place I had to go, where I live with my husband, my children, my dog and cat, where my life happens day after day, where my work is and where Duncan & Lane go to school and where I sleep each night. Yet, home is also this place where I grew up, where we just laid Mama's ashes to rest, where the Japanese Maple grows toward the sky, where the smells and the sounds bring me back to my childhood.

I thank God for my home.