Back Home Again.....

 

Hey, it's good to be back home again.

The long week is over.

We drove home in a veritable swirling snow storm. I71 was a slow mess.
But we kept sluggishly moving and the more we moved the more my body started to relax. The final few miles were beautiful snow covered roads with familiar fields and woods covered in a blanket of white, and my body just settled down inside my soul and smiled, knowing I was almost home.

We walked through the 4 inches of snow in our driveway, in through the door with Scott both carrying as much baggage as he could, and trying to guide my groggy body; and I walked upstairs, got undressed, got into my shower and just let the water wash over me and wash over me and wash over me, washing all the week off..... It felt so good to wash off what was still clinging to me from OSU and chemo and sickness and hair loss and try to return to "being" again.

I cried and cried - there was a well of tears inside me that demanded to be finally released. Scott peeked in to check on me and I told him I didn't want him to see me this way, still a little bloated from the steroids and pulling out handfuls of what is left of my hair, and he smiled and said "Babe, all you need is a comb and a little conditioner - I'll help you"..... We laughed - what man knows the word "conditioner"?? But he always knows the words I need to hear.

There are few things in life more humbling and more sweet than your husband drying your sore, mostly denuded head, and telling you "it looks just fine to me".....

He kicked all of our hospital smelling clothes to the basement to be washed later, and he set to work in the kitchen making me some food and prepared the couch for me to lay on, and he stroked my limp, weary body, and my almost hairless head and said "you are the most beautiful to me today".

Sometimes I am afraid to realize how much we mean to each other and how much we kind of "are" each other all through these years. I remember two years ago when he was being released from the Cleveland Clinic, and I was on I71 going north in a tremendous snow storm with most cars pulled off of I71 to wait it out, and I called him on my cell phone and told him I wasn't sure I could make it, and he said "I have to get out of here, Karen", and I made it.

He could barely make it into the house but I just remember him shuddering when he laid back on his bed; and he just held my hand for a long time.

I understand that so much better today. After you feel used up and empty and alone and sick, you have to return to your "home" - to the familiarity and sweetness and warmth of the one that loves you most here on earth.

There are "havens" and "refuges" that loved ones have set up for us and we are so grateful when we are there, but there is nothing like being home with the one that loves me and cares for me. The one that has worked to make a soft landing place for us, the "home" that is like no other. Maybe this is our "return" on our investment in this long marriage.

We are home for each other.


I feel these words so deeply tonight......

...."And oh, the time that I can lay this tired old body down
and feel your fingers feather soft up-on me
the kisses that I live for, the love that lights my way
the happiness that livin' with you brings me.

It's the sweetest thing I know of, just spending time with you
it's the little things that make a house a home.
Like a fire softly burning and supper on the stove.
And the light in your eyes that makes me warm

Hey, it's good to be back home again
Sometimes this old farm feels like a long lost friend
Yes, 'n, hey it's good to be back home again"

 

Cinnamon Lake, Home Again.