Leaving Home Again

I took a walk downtown to say goodbye while the whole town slept…

The past six months had been the stuff that dreams are made of. Somehow, someway, the “if I could go back” met me where I was standing and I found myself back in my hometown with my fourteen-year-old daughter.

Six months of Boyd, Texas healed me. Heavy-hearted, I stood there in the road that night. Forty-five years old and I was leaving home again. Only this time it was different. That road heading out of town looked so much different at forty-five than it had at seventeen. Because I know now how way leads on to way and how those we love may not be there when we make it back around again.

Even so, I couldn’t stay…

And that’s what made the goodbye so magical. There were a thousand things said to my tiny Texas town that night. A thousand prayers that went up. I could feel where I come from in my bones. And I could feel the spirits, past and present, urging me on…

The road from there to here runs through my heart. Like every road I’ve ever traveled, my experiences are etched upon me. Sunsets. Mountains. There is such poetry on the road. I discovered what is purple mountain majesty. I saw it, a living, breathing beautiful moment in time, and it took my breath away. I saw valleys, with little pockets of civilization, where souls I will never know (and yet souls I feel I have always known) are born, live, and finally cross over into what is next. In passing, I bless their time here. Wishing them well along life’s way.

We arrived on a Friday, February 8th, at rush hour. My love met me on the street, arms outstretched, warm and alive. I had done it. I had gone back, in order to go forward, reconciling with the past. There is power in going back. And magic where childhood waits. There is power in remembering.

Fifteen-year-old eyes upon me, watching my every move. Forty-five-year-old eyes upon her. She will be better for all this, I know. She will never be afraid to jump.

“Welcome to New York.” With those words an old dream came true while the promise of the future floated about me. The spirits past and present smiled. I settled into the city’s embrace, a grown woman ready for the world, while the child within me, resilient, patient, and brave, who first dared to dream the dream, wept…