Home is where you are.

Today, more than most days, I miss home. Yes, I'm currently staying in the house that I grew up in, sitting in the kitchen that we ate family dinner in every night. This is the house that I cleaned to earn my allowance, with the porch that I shoveled every time it snowed. There are the stairs that I fell down of too many times and the wrinkle in the carpet I always tripped over. There's the marking on the door frame where I measured myself 4 foot 7. Every dent, crack and corner holds precious memories, some that I don't even posses anymore. But as I sit in this old empty house, thinking about all the forgotten memories of when I called this home, I feel big, clumsily out of place. This isn't home.
Home is a half constructed cement house, over crowded and nestled in the midst of a little village called Nakazadee, surrounded by sugar cane fields. It has bars on the windows, but not barbed wire on the top of the fence, 5 buckets in the back courtyard, and an eclectic assortment of clothing dangling from a spider-web of twine. Each room is filled with bunk-beds and suitcases and dirty feet. Much less glamorous than American living, this is the home that my heart longs for.
But home is not really a place, its not about a physical place. Home can't be defined by a structure, by memories, by a group of people. Home is defined by you. Home is where you feel the most alive. It is the place where you become you, a place that allows you to be you. It is the epitome of love and peace. It is a instance of personal discovery, acceptance and growth. It is when you find yourself and lose yourself all at the same time. Home is living, working, growing, loving, sharing, thinking, dreaming, understanding, learning, giving, being and not wanting to be anywhere else.
So today I miss home: me, the muzungus, Nakazadee, Lugazi, Uganda, Africa.

in-between.

I'm in an airplane, some where thousands of miles above the mid-west, and I feel that this is the perfect place to think, because I'm not really anywhere. I feel that a location always sets precedence and biased in clear thinking. When I'm some place, I don't want to be there; I'm longing for somewhere else. Or, I get so wrapped up in the here and now that I naively disregard anything out of sight. But here, in limbo, I can look down at any place I want, I can regard, analyze, over analyze, contemplate where I've been and where I am going. Caught up in the excitement of going home, of seeing my mom and best friend, snuggling up on the couch with my puppy Beefcake, spending time with my big brothers, eating my Gramma's cooking, hugging my family, driving down to Connecticut, reminiscing in my childhood play ground, finally getting to finish my book, not having a care in the world, not having a place to be or a checklist of have-to's but instead, want-to's. I haven't been able to think of anything else, and trust me I haven't. Finals were a chaotic blur of all the material that I realized I should have learned this semester, and then just like that, it was all over. I quickly bounded off on my escape from a crazy semester. Now, as I take my first deep breathe, suspended between one place and another, I'm realizing all the amazing things I have in both places. When I'm living in Utah, I miss the Vermont greenery. I miss the pace of life, trees, people, calm, comfort, familiarity and everything that I've been so excited for. And when I get there, and I guess now, even before, I realize that I'm going to miss everything I'm leaving behind. Crazy, spontaneous, hectic life in Provo, Ut. This semester marked a very important turning point in my life. Completely life altering decisions were made, good ones and bad ones. Heartbreaks, intoxicating butterflies, deep conversations, insurmountable growth, contagious laughter, a real definition of love. As I look back on it all, I might not be able to translate my life into french, calculate the PRE for a data set, tell you that the 64th section of the Doctrine and Covenants teaches us about forgiveness (although it does) or control my fear as I address the room "honorable chair, fellow delegates..." But, I'll leave behind this semester having learned more than I think I ever have. I learned about life, love, trust, relationships, joy, faith, forgiveness, understanding, patience, time, help, diligence, prayer, and acceptance. Me 3 months ago probably wouldn't recognize me today. That's a whole lot of change in not a whole lot of time. All that growing was painful, excruciating. But, I'm better because of it. I'm a little bit stronger, a little bit wiser and a little bit closer to the person I want to become.
Right, so me. here, now. Here being a relative term, now being 11:39 am (although I don't know what time zone that is). I can't wait to land, to run for my bus and finally drop my over-packed luggage and hug my mom. I can't wait to say goodbye one more time and have another semester of self-discovery, healing, growth, and change. Mostly, I'm just anxious to see what happens. Ultimately I don't really know where I am headed, but I'm going there.

Pink Spoon.

I collect little things. Key word being little. I'm not a horder, or a pack rat. I don't need someone to make a reality TV show about me. I just like tokens. momentos. memories. I tack them to my bulletin board: a concert ticket from one of my favorite bands. a name tag. a hospital bracelet. the bib from my first road race. an address scribbled on a piece of paper. a button. a tassel. a note. a key chain. a sticker for the first time I donated blood. a change of major form. a necklace. a lift ticket. a package for silk and steel guitar strings. a luggage tag. Tonight I'm adding a spoon. The spoon is of little significants. In fact, most of these items are. But I keep them because they remind me of something much more important than their physical existence. Each of them carries a message, a lesson learned, a turning point in my life's direction.
So this little spoon, is so much more than a spoon. Aside from the fact that it enabled the consumption of the most healing serving of frozen yogurt I've ever eaten, it is a beautiful representation of today. It's a reminder of what real friends are. They are people that you can tell the truth to, and they'll still love you. Hey, they'll even taken out and buy you a condolence frozen yogurt and sit there and giggle with you as you let it melt down your little pink spoon.
That little pink spoon embodies excitement, excitement for the future. Anticipation of a brand new beginning, a new adventure. It establishes strength, a strength I've been longing to posses for so many years, a strength to show who I really am, to share what is more dear to me, and to become something greater than I once was.
A pink spoon reminds to remember all the little things that make me happy: retelling bizarre dreams at six in the morning, walking in a blanketing snowfall, singing christmas carols in the car, dragging your roommate out of bed, putting your favorite song on repeat, crawling under a comforting quilt, and texting your big brother.
Sometimes, even when we have good intentions, there's something better we could be doing; there's somewhere else we are suppose to be. And so today I learned to trust. Trust myself, trust my friends, trust my Heavenly Father. Because ultimately, He'll lead me right where He needs me. There are a lot of places I would want to be in the world, but no where more important than where He wants me. Thank goodness that He wants me home in Vermont in 48 hours.