Oct 11 - Write about returning home.

I didn't realize until this morning (shows you exactly how on the ball I am with this whole writing thing!) that today's prompt comes on the day I plan to leave for Crooked Creek, my old home. I miss it so much. I love going home. I love visiting my mom and family.

This time I'm going home for my mither-mother's 70th birthday! Bren & I are driving together with Wyatt and Misty and we're planning on meeting Karen in Edmonton for night tonight. Tomorrow Ash and her kids fly in from North Carolina, the Lord willing. And we're all gathering for the festivities on Saturday and Sunday! So exciting!

Returning home has changed throughout the years. When we first got married I had years of angst preparing to go home. I focused a lot on my clothes, which I knew were never quite like my fashionable friends back home. Really, the hard parts then were finding my own direction while becoming like my classy family here and letting going of my ideas of how to do things. But always back home, the church smelled like church and the crowds mingled in the foyer and at Christmas there were pristine piles of snow and familiar faces and parties galore.

Then came the years of little boys and overwhelming tiredness and the grief of my dad dying and skinny days in unhealthy ways. But always back home, I found people who understood, people who remembered the grief. I found clover by the roadsides and tall spruce and tears of healing. I found old friendships and strong uncles and aunts and coffee at the old fabric store.

Slowly the hurts have healed and going home is not so poignant. When I go home I find laughter and youth I don't recognize singing in the programs and babies I hadn't heard about. The moms of my friends still hug me, the new church has no old memories for me and my friends and I point out our youth children to each other. It's different returning home now, because now I've lived longer in Swanson than I've lived anywhere else in my life. I've learned to like a smaller congregation. I've learned that there's good things where ever I live.

And I really can hardly wait to get back 'home-home' to my family of men. I will truly be returning home.