The penultimate post

Since I've come home, life - in all of its to-do lists, color-coded schedules, and long-term agendas - has rushed forward to meet me.  In the spring, I'll need to start apartment-hunting.  On June 16, I'll graduate from college.  Two months later, I'll receive my white coat.

But I'll come to those bridges soon enough.  For now, a narrower focus will suffice.

Tomorrow marks two weeks since I arrived.  Two weeks.  And a week from then, I'll be moving back to Schenectady.  This is hard to believe.

Because I'm still in Galway

My bedroom door

Remember when I said I needed some time to be still?  Well, I found it.

My little nook

Whew.  And now I feel able to think a little more clearly.

Because quiet time is precious

There is a little boy curling into my side, breathing soft and slow.  I wonder if he's dreaming of Spiderman.  Spiderman's his latest hero, you know.  How I've missed this...

I'm home...and it's good.  So good.

Homebound, Part II: ready or not...

Hi, friends.  I'm sorry that I've been AWOL for a little while.  Being home has proved to be a greater shock than I anticipated.  I'm going to need some time to process...but in the meantime, here's some reading material.

The plane out of Shannon was tiny - it looked like a baby bush plane.  As I toted my bag across the airstrip, I thought, that thing's really too small to be carrying anyone anywhere.

There's the airport from my window.  And it's hardly visible because of the glare, but directly below those letters is the arrivals corridor where I remember standing in August.

Despite my apprehension, the hour sped by and I soon found myself in Manchester...or, to be more specific, at baggage claims in Manchester.  My bag's checked all the way through, though.  Where am I supposed to go?

Because it's important to be real

On some mornings, it hits like a wave.  A tidal wave.  Out of nowhere.

I hadn't cried for days.

For days, I'd been preoccupied with "lasts": my last weekend with dear friends, my last time at church, my last hug with this person or that person.  They're bittersweet, these "lasts".  Each one pulls me away from the ones I'll miss, yet nudges me toward those whom I've been missing all this time.  And it's simple physics, isn't it?  Two equal and opposite forces, battling it out...and I'd been motionless, pleasantly lost in the distraction of it all.

Because home can be complicated

Yesterday, in mentioning my mixed feelings about going home, I wasn't as complete as I could've been.  In describing all of that nervousness, I focused on thoughts of Union and ignored one important factor - something that, yesterday, was too intimidating to write.  Friends, writing something - the very act of molding the the raw idea into words and sentences - lends it weight.

Reality.

And this is the reality I avoided yesterday:

A few winters ago, right from the driver's seat

Home.