I mentioned that we have now marked our first year here in the Annapolis Valley. We often are asked why we came here. That is a complicated question to answer and makes us look a little crazy no matter how we answer. We are a little crazy by the way. Often, it feels like our life here is temporary in the same way that each place we have lived in has been. I have a hard time settling into the reality that we are setting down roots and that I have time make my mark on this land and home. The difference is that there is nothing new on the horizon. We have no other plan, no we are doing this until… And oh how that scares me sometimes.
Can I be perfectly honest? Sometimes, I am so very, very lonely. I miss my mom. I miss my siblings. I miss my friends, especially the ones just a walk up the street. I miss familiar faces and places. I miss simple shopping. I miss familiar roads and towns. I miss cactus and flat fields even though I don’t particularly love either. I miss the music at church on Sunday. I miss what was comfortable. I miss being loved.

Most of the time, I just swallow the missing back and keep going. Because if I acknowledge the missing, it hurts that much more. And if I admit how much I miss than it might seem like I regret being here. Or that I don’t realize that the ones I belong with most are right here with me. So it’s easier to ignore it. Yet, somehow like a wound festering, the missing can only be ignored for so long. So I have been trying to acknowledge it more, facing it the same way that I faced my fear of ticks.

Last week, I went with a group of ladies to Frenchy’s (an great thrift store chain) and out for lunch. For the first time ever, I left one of my babies with a bottle in the capable hands of her daddy while I spent a day shopping with other ladies. And this felt a bit more like home.

On Sunday, we had friends and an older couple from church over for supper. And this felt a bit more like home.

Tonight, we walked over to our neighbor’s to borrow some ingredients for making cheese. Aneliese and Cecily laughed and played with their older children who set things up and dove into imaginary play with them. And as we walked home, this felt a bit more like home.

The missing is still there, but the spaces are slowly being filled. Not because I am ignoring what I am missing but because I am being shaped by it. And we are slowly making a home.