The Space Between | Where Honesty Lives

Let me be honest. As in the “stop washing the dishes and dry your hands with a towel so we can talk” kind of honest.

I don’t know how to come home. I’m not even sold on what those words mean.

I’ve been gone for a while. Maybe too long. Maybe not long enough. But enough to not recognize the shadows my apartment makes at 2AM. Long enough to feel funny about using a tube of toothpaste that is bigger than the size of my thumb. Long enough to think about what home means.

I’m still thinking about it. At times home seems like an illusion that only exists for other people. Hallmark has convinced us that home is a wreathed door illuminated by an eternally lit porch beyond which people who love and respect you anxiously await your arrival on Christmas Eve.

Hallmark never told me that wreathes die, porch lights go out, and people move on. Hallmark never told me that even if the wreath is still alive, I may come back to find I have grown allergic to pine. Hallmark didn’t teach me any of that. Life did.

There is a reason “you can never go home again” is uttered so often by people who have run out of words in a conversation. It’s true. You can never go back to what you thought was real. Maybe it was real. Maybe it was something you thought would always be there. But home isn’t always like the oversize sweater you know will make you feel better when you’re sick. Sometimes home shuts it’s door in your face.

So I’ve been searching and I’ve been learning.

One never reaches home, but wherever friendly paths intersect the whole world looks like home for a time ~ Hermann Hesse

I’m finding pieces of my new home. I found it in the happy scream of my darling friend from across the empty coffee shop as she literally ran to me. I found it in my niece clutching a stuffed penguin I gave her for her birthday. I found it in a late night text message from a friend after admitting I felt I had messed up my life. I found it in the toiletry bag I have been living out of for the last 3 years. I found it in the hug from my sister when I drove 3 hours to surprise her.

I know some days this world can seem as cold and uninviting as the first time you stood in the street and watched half your heart drive away. But I’m choosing to believe in home again. I’m finding it in me. And I’m finding it in you. I need you. I need your kindness to the barista at the coffee shop. I need you to put on your lucky jersey on game day. I need your laugh when the spring wind blows your umbrella inside out. I need you to help a stranger change their car tire.  I need your patience at the post office. I need you to show up. I need you to  believe in this idea of home with me.

I’m coming home…. I promise you, my darling,  I am coming home…