Home Sweet Home Again

Sometimes I think the best vacations are the ones you don’t mind coming home from. Sure, there is something to be said for the vacation you never want to end (if your funds are endless), that fantasy world you get to sample that makes the rest of your life a miserable and futile act of wanting, but I’m not sure that always does any long term good. Unless you’re Shirley Valentine. So I don’t mean to imply that the best vacations are not good vacations; it has nothing to do with having a bad time. I think, in fact, for it to qualify as such a vacation, one actually needs to have a good time, but then (still?) feel good about being home. It is a combination of having a great vacation, a few fun days away, and returning to reality that is a life from which you realize you really didn’t need a break.

As I have written, I had a great time in the PNW. I spent time with an old friend and got to visit two of my favorite cities. (Thanks again, Tam!) And even though I had a teary goodbye, I was happy to come home to this life of mine that wasn’t driving me crazy, to a life I see even more clearly is blessed. And again, there is no implication here that her life is chaos. I didn’t go visit a friend in a crack house and think thank god I can still get by on alcohol! Rather, I was happy to visit with a friend and see that she has a good life and to be a guest in that life for a few days. And it was okay to leave her in her element and return to my own.

It is nice to be home again. I hate to sound materialistic, but I like my things. I like to be around my things. My couch, my vases, my art. I like knowing where everything is. And not having to ask to use them. (Okay, now I sound like a control freak. I’m not. Although I do think I am particularly independent.) I like my life and my relaxed summer routine. I like writing in the morning before I do anything else. I did that today before I sat by my pool today and read. Then I came in late this afternoon to my chilly AC and made a plate of cheese and crackers to snack on as the lunch I missed while I was engrossed in reading. Today was a good day. Most of my days are.

Yesterday, as I made my way to the baggage carousel at Bradley International, a flight mate—walking beside me at that hurried, yet exhausted, pace of travelers who have made it home after a long day of travel—turned to me and said, “Be it ever so humble, there’s no place like home.”

Indeed.