Where the Heart is.

Even this far away from where I grew up... things are the same.

They say home is where the heart is... for a while I had lost my heart and home. I went to a dinner event and had old teachers ask me where I was living. I felt like I didn't have that answer, I believed that I had no home. I was twenty-one years old and had nothing to show for it I thought, while metaphorically licking my still fresh wounds.   I'm now as far away as I could possibly be from any place that I would have called home without taking a plane ride, and guess what? I feel more at home than I have in a very very long time. All of this in spite of the fact that I wake up to only two familiar faces every day, I spend half my nights falling asleep on a couch, and every day I encounter more and more new faces, new names to memorize.

There's Bob, and Jim, and Jana, and Kathrine, and Courtney, and....

I'm not twenty-one years old though, I'm twenty-one years young, and I have gained twenty-one years of knowledge to show for it, and an incredibly supportive and amazing family. My family celebrates dinner every Sunday together, as long as its possible we will stop everything.. put everything else aside to spend one evening with those who are close to us. I know right about now my loved ones are all sitting around a table to eat a delicious meal prepared by my loving step-mother. Three of us are missing from that table, but when we can, we will be back. Surprisingly, I still had a family dinner... this other family, to whom I bear no blood relations, sits down every Sunday for dinner with their loved ones! I have never met a single one of these people before today, but they invited me into their home to share a meal with them and be with them during their celebration of family. They helped me to feel 'at home' because they knew that I had felt so far away from it. I had my own family dinner on the other side of the country today... oh. and there was just about as many animals as there were people.

And there's Fluffy, and Dozer,and Herb and...

I learned today that the saying "Home is where the Heart is" is really true. My heart is inside of me, no matter where I am, and no matter where I go, I will always be at home. Friends and Family ask me "when are you coming home?" I know they mean the location, as in a location that is closer to them... but in a very real way, I am home right now.

Happy Days Readers

-PRKW-