All my life, I have wanted to be at home, more than anywhere else. Every day after school I’d grab something to eat, race up to my bedroom and curl up with a book, happy to limit my traveling to places in my imagination. When I played with my dolls and teddies, I loved tucking them in. I do the same now with my youngest. It’s going to be hard to let go of those times when my children get big.
‘Cosy’ was and still is one of my favourite words. I love pulling the curtains on a winter’s night and knowing my family are close by. Sitting having coffee with my parents, or watching a movie huddled up with my little family on the settee gives me so much contentment.
Of course, leaving home as we become adults is a necessary part of life. I found it challenging, especially when I spent a year in France. Looking back, I see that homesickness actually took away from the amazing experiences offered to me. I never fully gave myself to anything as my heart was too devoted to home. I regret that now, but I don’t think I could ever do it differently. Once a home bird, always a home bird.
As life brings its own inevitabilities of age, sickness and loss, I’m realising that what we, I, understand by the word ‘home’ has to change. Home cannot be a physical place with unchanging people. We can’t let our hankering after the way things were or the people we miss, blind us to the remarkable life that’s still out there waiting for us. I have no idea how to do that and I wish I did.
I wonder if we need to be more nomadic as time goes on, bringing our sense of home with us, whatever journey we’re forced to travel.
My greatest comfort is the sure knowledge that a forever home with our heavenly Father is at the end of all this, and all the people we miss so desperately are there, waiting for us.
Happy traveling, and don’t forget: there’ll always be books and biscuits along the way!
A room of one's own 