I went to bed on a bit of a high, woke broken apart like a hammered rock.

Today I start the journey back to CT.  I’ve made it as easy for myself as possible.  I drive down to San Jose today and my son Jeff and I will fly out early Thursday morning to JFK.  My husband Steve is already in NYC for work. Friday morning we’ll take the train to CT and rent a car.  Such a plan, and yet, I feel sick. From here, I can pretend, somehow, that my brother is alive. I did it when my father died. It will be harder there.

The last time I saw him we were blessed with snow, and as the family gathered, we went through almost a cord of wood in a few days.  We were up both early and late, talking, laughing, playing games. We knew it was a goodbye but there he was, and now, well, of course, I’ve written of how I feel him here, in different form, but I feel sick again at all that now comes, and I pause to know and acknowledge I’m here right now, looking out at the ridge as it dances in fog, reflecting tears.

There was a year I traveled.  I’ve written one part of that year of travel in “Airing Out the Fairy Tale,” and then while sitting on a granite cliff on Monhegan Island, I felt how clearly the journey is within.  I came home. I still travel, but I’m aware of my carbon footprint. My home provides all I need and sometimes we are called to leave.

There is a book I love: City by Clifford D. Simak.  It was originally published in 1952 and was prescient about what home might come to mean to some.  The main character’s home has become his castle, run and protected by robots. His best friend dies and he tries to mobilize to go to the funeral.  While he’s debating his ability to do that, and finally overcomes the hesitation, his robot, his companion and friend, has sent the transport away saying he, the man, never leaves.

I do leave, obviously, and I do love travel.  I loved my journey to Zion, Sedona, Tucson, and Phoenix this fall, but this trip is different and this morning there is pain.   I allow the pain to be there, and the tears.