Coming Home

As we have shed our address, and 90% of all our worldly possessions, I have come to understand that “home” is a very relative term.

Historically, when I've spent time on the road (which usually means visiting family), I've always enjoyed the moment that I come back - to a space that is entirely mine. It's a place where I get to make the rules, and I can privately unwind without worrying about the mess I'm leaving behind, or if I'm upsetting anyone else's schedule.

I love flopping across my bed and smelling my pillow, stepping into my shower and using all the hot water, and then - after - maybe even walking around n[censored]d for a while. I can browse the fridge without having to worry that I'm about to destroy someone else's lunch for tomorrow, leave my clean clothes in a basket for an extra day or two, and I don't have to worry about what someone else thinks of my sleep schedule.

It's a space where I live in the most active sense of the word, but it's also a place that has the evidence of my life – past, present, and future. That's where I spilled the mineral spirits and ruined the finish on the table; that's MY favorite chair where I like to sit and hold Annabelle; that is MY pile of books I'm planning on getting around to reading...and those are the orange peels that Richard left in the bathroom trashcan, even though I've asked him a million times to only throw food away in the kitchen.

The point is that it's a place where I can stretch out as literally or figuratively as I desire.

We all need a place like that.

But Richard and I decided to forgo that place two months ago when we hit the road indefinitely, for his Viral Storm tour. (For a brief recap, click here.)

The moment it hit me was about 4 weeks ago. Richard and I were headed back to our hotel after having run a couple errands, and he wanted to stop in at Barnes & Noble to work for a while. But I didn't want to. I wanted to... Well, the first thought that came to my mind was “go home.” But then I had to stop and reassess what I really wanted.

If I didn't stay with Richard, then I could go back to The Plaza alone and read, write, or think. If I decided to stay with him, then I could – wouldn't you know it – read, write, or think. There wasn't laundry to catch up on, a lesson to prepare, or a dog to let outside. There was nothing to go to.

That was the moment that I realized that I am my home – and that it is defined by the life that I've chosen to carry around with me. I'd shed all the peripherals; everything that was an outward manifestation of who I was. There weren't old friendships to fall into, or an image to maintain, or bosses to please. They were gone.

It was just me with a journal in my hand. And what would that notebook say? Because almost everything I had in the world was distilled down to the voice within those pages.

And you know how it's nice to think of new beginnings? A new year means new diet goals; returning to school after the summer means possibilities for new friends; moving to a new home means you'll never have a dirty house again.

But is it not true that we often set the same diet goals every year, fall into the same relationships, and keep accumulating clutter in the same places? The new beginning wears off, and then we are left with the same resources we had when we started – ourselves.

That's where our desires, yearnings, successes and failings originate.

Lately, I've had the thrill of these new beginnings almost on a daily basis. The patterns that manifest themselves over a life time are now condensed into days and weeks. I'm setting goals and failing regularly. It's like all of my bad habits are just floating to the top of the pot and that's all that I can see.

I am in very close-quarters with my life these days. It's caused me to reflect deeply, and often, on the qualify of its fibers. I often joke that I start out with big plans for change, but then suddenly it's Wednesday and it's time to do laundry.

Well, now there are no excuses. It's just me, and a whole lot of tomorrows stretching out ahead of me. There aren't any walls to keep me distracted from all the things I'd like to change “when I get around to it.”

It's been exhausting, and it's been invigorating. I feel encompassed about by my shortcomings, yet thrilled by the unlimited possibilities in each day.

I've shed a lot of things these last several weeks, which has opened my eyes to real things it's time to let go of. Letting go of my address has opened up the door to truly coming home – to myself.

And I'm certainly not suffering from a shortage of places to be. One of the things that has become most apparent during this time of reflection is that my home is so much closer to me than I ever realized, and yet it is also so much bigger than I ever imagined.

It is me, and yet it is everywhere.

I want to stretch out on earth. I want this world to hold the evidence of my life. That is MY sunset; that's where I held Richard's hand and discovered a new layer of love; and that is MY horizon – the sum of MY possibilities stretching out in every direction.

How would I be able to breathe anywhere else?

These days, when someone asks me where I'm from, it's an awkward moment for me. Dallas? South Carolina? California?

Perhaps this would be the most accurate answer – for all of us:

I. Am. Here.