The Road Home.

“But still they lead me back

To the long winding road

You left me waiting here

A long long time ago

Don't leave me standing here

Lead me to your door"

As we age, and as far as I know we all do, we look backward, forward and from many different angles of what our life has laid out for us.

It's when you are 18 or so, you often hit the road of life. But there are many different roads to take.

Life on the business road may or may not turn out to be as glamorous you thought it might be; you fly, drive, swim (actually you don't swim) to the place you are visiting on a very temporary basis. For me, it’s usually a Midwestern town that is welcoming, yet still not home. To quote from the Wizard of Oz, “There’s no place like home.” 

But what about when your old home is no longer your home, and you're not on a business trip or vacation? Change happens. When it does you have to be prepared for the awkwardness of a new bedroom, kitchen, toilet, everything---we recently went through this as we moved from one community to another.  Since moving, I have had to learn the roads to our home. Whereas I thought it would be easy, last weekend not only did I get lost, but had to use GPS to locate my home. Thanks to my iPhone all turned out well.

Recently, I read on Facebook where a friend of mine was doing something I had to go through when my Dad passed away. They sold their home they grew up in. Home for me was the trusted structure I had ever entered. It was safe, it was embedded in my mind as the place I would go to when I knew all was going to be okay. It no longer is part of who I am, and even though I was less than a half-mile away this past weekend, there was no way I was going to venture back. (It would have been too awkward as I no longer felt welcome.)

I know of a few people who continue to live in the home where they were raised. Some purchased it from their parents, and/or some have gone back home to live during a time of transition; whatever it is, I feel a bit of jealousy. Not from where I am today, but of what I miss when I think about the door I would enter and feel welcome. It’s a door I will never walk through again; I am just finding new doors to enter, and know I will always have the key to the past when I want to travel back in time. (But the ones I love, and security of where I grew up, is gone.)

A few weeks ago, one of our daughters walked out our door to a land far far away. She went to Southeast Asia for a “gap year.” If we had gap years when I was her age, I didn’t know about them. But one thing I do know, is she will walk through many doors and hopefully pick up memories. We have made sure, there is a family waiting for her when she returns home in the summer.

The photo above was taken in the middle of a road outside Vail, Colorado; yes I checked to make sure there were no cars or trucks coming down the highway, I just needed to see where the road would take me through my trusty Nikon. Funny, I still don’t know for sure.

Thanks for stopping by.