Just to be Home

It's Friday for another hour, so it's the perfect timing for a "Full Disclosure Friday" post.

I've spent weeks stressed about many different things going on our lives.  I've remained joyful, hopeful, and tried so very hard to not let the stress overtake.  I've succeeded much of the time.  Yet, others....

I've failed.

I've felt such a heavy weight that is so hard to describe.  Tonight for the first time in so long I TRULY laughed and felt light again.  My heart was open without reserve.

In those moments, I realized what some of the weight has been.

Homesickness.

I'm simply homesick.

It's been almost a year since I've been home.

We love, value, and cherish our lives here.  "Here" is where we have turned a house into a home for our family.  "Here" is where I've found myself in ways I didn't know possible.  Where I've grown into my own skin and found a deeper faith and connection with God.  "Here" is home for us.  "Here" is where life happens and joy has overflowed.  "Here" is where our marriage has healed, restored, and exploded.  "Here" is where God has placed us for a purpose.

But home is still home.

They say you can't go home again.

But I want to.

I need to.

I wish there was a way to just pack up, take a month, and go home.

Oh yes, there is family we miss and we would cherish time with.  Babies I've only seen in pictures, but never touched, smelled, or snuggled.  Relatives that mean the world.

I'd love to be home again.  It still hurts immensely to go home and not see Daddy waiting, but I still want to go home.  Drive those curves and pull up that hill to Windy Hill Angus Farm which we've lovingly called "Hurst B&B" the last several years.  Sit on that back porch with a view that proves that God created an amazingly intricate world for our pleasure.  Listen to the crickets and see the stars like they are as close as just reaching up and grabbing them.  Rub my hand over his tractor and look at his pride and joy classic cars (don't DARE touch those!!!! LOL!) Sit in his chair.  Sit at his big desk and spin around in his office chair.  How on earth could something be so organized and so disorganized at the same time?  Just see his files still sitting on his desk in his "PERFECT", teeny-tiny handwriting that seems so out of character for such a large, powerful man.  Oh yes, how I wish I could go home.  Even though "home" isn't the same without him.

I'd love to sit with Teresa.  OK---sitting isn't the right word.  It would be scrapbooking, cooking, gardening, sewing, or running every which way doing something that would put Betty Crocker or Martha Stewart to shame.  Just to sit and talk.  Oh my.  To go home again.

To go just down the road a mile and sit with Granny and Pa.  Listen to their stories and learn.  Reminisce about the most amazing childhood memories sitting on their swing.  Learning so much about life that I didn't know I was learning at the time.  Some biscuits and grape jelly wouldn't hurt either. People may try, but you just can't duplicate it.  Oh my.  To go home again.

Yet, as amazing as that would be, it's far more than that.

I'm homesick for so much more.

The pace of life. The simplicity.

How I wish I could just sit with so many that mean so much to Kevin, myself, and the two of us together.  Those we've learned so much from.  Those we've laughed with.  Those we've cried with.  Those that have shaped us through the hardest times of our lives.  Most especially those that led us along our paths that deepened our walks with Christ.  To get those hugs from special people that just can't be replaced through email/letters/facebook.  Just to go home again and SOAK it in.  No rush.  Ears and hearts open to the conversations that matter.

How I really wish we could just sit and listen to so many preachers that we crave to hear from.  Those that have already gained their heavenly rewards.  Those that are preaching from pulpits in different places.  Those that preached the Bible without regards to political correctness.  Those that brought life to scripture.  Even some that we value even though we've not heard them in person----those that have grown up with us that are now ministers.  Oh how, I wish we could go home and sit awhile. Get our toes stepped on, our sin exposed.  Driven to change.  Encouraged. Uplifted.

To soak in that praise and worship that is distinctly "home".  The kind where you feel God moving in your heart before you ever hear the first note on the piano/keyboard.  Seeing those special people with their fingers flying over the keys as if their hands never touched them.

Community church camp.
Friday night football and 5th Quarter services afterwards.
Back porch rockers.
Sweet tea in a mason jar.  Catching lightning bugs in those jars later in the night.
Cranking the handle on the ice cream freezer and waiting with mouth watering anticipation.
Hills, valleys, and curves that "tickle your tummy" as Bradlee says when we visit.

Just to go home again.

Maybe it's that our kids are growing up.  A new chapter of school is beginning.  The realization that some we hold dear aren't always going to be with us.  Maybe it's the melancholy of watching some of Adriana's friends that we value so dearly leaving for college.  Maybe it's seeing pictures of things from home and missing it.

Maybe it's just that longing that God has placed in us to crave heaven.  Our real home.

Just to be home.