Home, not Home

Some of this was written in the last two weeks of January, during my stay in Los Angeles.  

Home is not a place
of a telephone number
or a hall closet
or where we have slumbered.

Home is not four walls
or a kitchen basin
or long silk curtains
or the yard we have played in.

Home is just really
the place that you know,
a stirring desire,
that familiar glow.


"You can never go home again."

Who said that?
Why is it such a broad statement we hear so often?

I went home.  I didn't go to the Bay Area, but I went to California and I am home.
I just didn't know that until now.  I take everything for granted.  People, places, food, work, all of it, I take it all for granted.  I am fortunate in my mind set that I feel things will always be o.k.

The slow creep of "What have I done?" began to invade my consciousness, but I know things will turn out right.  Even so, battling all the emotions I felt caused me to lose my driver's license, two bank cards, and two credit cards on Venice Beach.  I was unable to get a hold of the airlines due to the storm about to hit the East Coast and so extended my trip and bought a new ticket ...only then to lose my passport and another credit card that had been Fed Ex'd to me.  With stressed filled phone calls, I did learn that even without any I.D. they may let you on the plane if you have your print-out and are white.  You just have to get there at least 2 hours early.  (I made up the "white" part.)

I had such a great time, that I expect a crash in mood, which happened upon returning to the Midwest.  In the car there was not enough oxygen and my lungs became constricted cavities of anxiety.  It's not too bad.  The sun is rising.  It is a bleak, white blue-grey of empty space.  The light helps and we are blasting Killing Joke.

Home will not be leaving.  It is always here.  I am o.k. to go back to the Midwest.  I am o.k. knowing my that my stomach will often turn to anxious knots while driving through those winter landscapes with their stark beauty that baffles me so.

I know that I can face the challenges of this new life because home is still in California.  It is not going away because I live somewhere else.  And it will not be cold forever.  And I do not have to stay forever.  I trust my abilities to make it work however this new chapter plays out.