the long way home

every blogpost needs a sound track. and we all need a little more tom waits in our lives. if you can't handle tom, feel free to cue up the norah jones cover as you read along. we're just more of a tom waits kind of family around here, whatever that means.

camp is over. the last of the staff is leaving tomorrow. jamin and cora keep asking me when are we going to do arts and crafts and why don't I push them on the swings like their counselor does. they spend most of their time playing camp, "teaching" me songs I couldn't get out of my head all summer because there was always some group somewhere singing them at the tops of their lungs. thankfully the dining hall is still serving meals for retreat groups or jamin might really go into shock.




this isn't home. quinipet, for all its wonders and beachfront property, ain't got nothin' on redbud springs. and people from long island don't even know what bluegrass music really is. and we have a lot of living left to do in brevard. but once we figured out where home really is, we knew we could take the long way to get there.

so I am taking a year's leave of absence from the family place. that's the only real decision that we've made. as far as short term plans, we're leaving here for new hampshire next week to visit some redbud family and celebrate our seventh anniversary as a happily married couple. eric flies home for a wedding in brevard, then makes the trip back up with our very best friend allyson. we're here on shelter island until the end of september. we need this time.

we are walking on the beach every night after supper. we're watching as many sunsets as we can. we are posing for pictures in front of yachts far bigger than our house. we are homeschooling and staying in the flow and listening so hard it hurts sometimes. we need this time, this pace, this rhythm. at least for right now.

I don't really know what we are doing beyond that, and that feels pretty okay right now. I am learning what we are good at, how to balance that between the four of us. how to hold hands and jump, how to appreciate the view from here. and now that we know where it is, it feels good to take the long way home.