There's no place like home...

I have lived away from home since the age of 19. I am now about to be 30. When I say away from home, I don't mean down the street, across town, other side of the state, same coast even. I mean AWAY...I have lived away from home for over 10 years. My family and I get to see my parents 3-4 times a year if we're lucky. It is great when parents come to visit me. I avoid all sorts of "inconveniences."( I hardly look at it like that but couldn't think of another word) Packing suitcases, making sure everyone is wearing shoes that are comfortable but can be easily taken off in the security line of an airport, charging cellphones, packing backpacks but NO LIQUIDS making sure to have cash which I never have and my divers license readily available but not to available bc God for bid you loose it when traveling.

All of the stuff that goes into leaving home and flying on 2 or more airplanes can all be avoided when they come to me BUT... I must say everything is worth it to travel all that way and walk into a house that is filled with all the memories, love, laughing, tears, smells, furniture, books, photos... ALL THE PHOTOS ( my Dad loves pictures as much as I do)food, bikes, beds,blankets, chairs and everything else, it is always worth it the second I walk in the door! I suppose there are some people that walk into the doors of their former homes and cringe. Maybe the memories that flood their minds aren't good ones, the smells they remember bring about thoughts of unpleasant times. For me I am one of the lucky ones that grew up with a house full of love and laughing, smells of family dinners every night and memories that I treasure and truly miss.

I LOVE bringing my children home with me. I love that my Mom can be a packrat and doesn't throw anything anyway. That my daughter always finds toys my sisters and I used to play with and stuffed animals I loved as a child. They sleep in the bed I used to sleep in and go through the drawers of what used to be my dresser and find pictures of Mommy who used to be young like them, going through the same drawers and sleeping in the same bed.

One of my favorite things about going home though is our family dinners. Every night...who can say they have family dinners EVERY night...but I DID and still do when I go home. It was the time when my father would read his blessing over us from a book in a little drawer at the end of the table. The time when everyone had a chair I always sat to the right of my father, my mother across from me and my sisters beside my mother and I. No one was allowed to answer the phone if it dared to ring or get up with out first being excused. It was 45min to an hour or more of just us talking and always laughing reminiscing and story telling. Time for us to have uninterupted time together to get to know each other and stay in touch.

Home...I have had many "homes" in my life. My children have all been born in different states, we move a lot. I will most likely never live near my parents or my former home. I will most likely never have a home that I live in for any real extended period of time. My homes have been apartments, duplexes and houses. I have loved them all for what they were at the time. Each holds different feelings and memories of my life. Pieces of myself and my family that we left behind are held in walls, crammed in cracks in the floor, shut in windows, grow through flowers we planted, but what we manage to take from place to place always makes it home. Our memories, our smells, our laughter, our tears...US we make it home. Thats what I love about going back to where I started. It's filled with me, we and us the place that holds it all...home.