In exactly one week, we head off to a whole new life…a new world to us, new environment, new culture, new (to us) house…..everything new and different!!
I am scared, excited, fearful, exhilarated, anxious, and sad… I see the sun peeking up as I write and I think of the thousands of sun rises and sunsets which have encroached upon this world for me… I’ve had the happiest sunsets I ever thought possible right here in this little frustrating town. I’ve had the absolutely most phenomenal sunrises here as well. I can say with complete candor, I’ve had experiences and moments here which were the very stuff that dreams are made of…the very fiber of fairy tales come to life. I have made some unbelievably wonderful friends and known some interesting people. I’ve laughed till my stomach hurt for days following and my cheeks felt like they had done strenuous Pilates. I’ve cried more tears than I knew I had in me. Here, my heart has been so full of love I thought it would burst and so broken, I thought I would die. I’ve spent days on the beach about which I could have written novels, both comedic and romantic. I’ve met pilots traveling through, partied with hundreds of people inside military planes. I’ve gone swimming by moonlight, laughing through the waves. I’ve skipped in the rain and laughed in the snow. I’ve sat out and I’ve danced. I’ve lived in ten different houses here, all with unique people and experiences. I’ve been single here. I’ve been married here. I’ve been a mother here and responsibility free. I had my first real boyfriend here and my first grown-up love. I’ve learned lessons I never even imagined as a child. I’ve grown, I’ve stagnated, I’ve flown free as a butterfly and I’ve been imprisoned like a criminal.
I’ve played house and wife, mother and employee. I’ve played conservative party-girl, lost hippie child, and unemployed beach bum. When I moved away for college and a few years later my world crashed, I ran here. This has been the only home (“base”) I’ve ever known. The only place I’ve been able to return to (come “home” to)in the whole world no matter what happened. As much as I’ve often felt out-of-place here, out of sorts, and like an “outsider”, over the years, I’ve become this place; both the things I love here and the things I don’t. This place is a part of me…a huge and irrevocable piece of my growth and my essence. I will carry people and memories, lessons and experiences from here as though it’s part of my genetic DNA. In spite of the fact that I did not “grow up” here, I very much did grow up here in so very many ways. The people and things I’ve done and known here have shaped my soul in a good ways and bad. The sand from the beaches has become embedded in my skin forever. The memories rooted in my soul, never to be un-done, even if someday forgotten. I carry every person, every moment, every encounter, every drop of beach water, every crashing wave, every love, every hurt, every tear, and every laugh with me for the rest of my days. I’ve been hated here, loved here, nurtured and abused here on every imaginable and unimaginable level. I’ve wildly dreamed of escaping this hell-hole and I’ve ached to return to its embracing shores…
I’ve never known a “home”, a home base, a place to run to…never. And yet, I knew that here; the home of a place to go when I was lost and scared in the world (my dad). The home where I felt I was always supposed to be, the place I walked into and realized I had been holding my breath for so many years, I didn’t realize how beautiful breathing could be (Dave).
This has been the only home I’ve ever known by any definition or connotation of the word “home”. I am scared to the pit of my soul to leave here…and yet I’m scared equally to stay. I fear I can never come “home” again, in the way that this is now my home. I’m a mother and a college graduate and I wasn’t even raised here, and yet somehow it almost feels like I’m leaving the nest for the very first time. I feel like a high school graduate heading off into the world on my own into the far and unknown beyond.
What will be here when I next return to visit, to live, to escape, to…???? What feelings will remain? How will I be changed? Nothing will ever stay the same as it is now and has been.
Life is scary. Change is inevitable. This was never my home…and yet strangely it’s also been the only home I’ve ever known.