...'tis the season...

...tomorrow, instead of being in my place at St Johns,
joining my fellow choristers in welcoming the Advent season
and the new church year ....
I will be going "home", probably for the last time...

Last year on Dec. 8, my childhood home [ and familys' ancestral home] ,
was completely destroyed by fire...
we had sold the property
and the almost 100 year old house built by my grandfather
was just a shell as the new owner was renovating it...

and then, it was gone...
along with severe damage to the huge surrounding trees and destruction of some nearby out buildings...

Mom and my brother were of the same mind...
"Good ", they said...
"God didn't want any family but ours living there", Mom continued...
I'm not so sure about that, but I've always been a pragmatist...

Both Mom and my brother went to see the site..
"...just the cement steps, that's all that's left..."
my brother took pictures..
I never looked at them...
I prefer to remember the house as I see it now...
surrounded by huge trees..."Home"...

I walked through the ashes of a fire at school once...
I can still smell it over 20 years later....
No, I'll keep the pictures of home that I have in my head...

Mom was the organist at her church from age 77 - 92...
tomorrow, they are dedicating the organ that has been restored in her name...
They decided to dedicate the organ restoration fund in her name before she died
and she was very pleased at the gesture ...
After her death, last January 17, 2007, at the age of 94 and a half,
so much money was raised in memorial tributes to her,
that the restoration was quickly completed...

Last year, Mom was in the hospital in Fresno from before Christmas through New Years...
One day, as I visited, she had a phone call from a friend and as they chatted,
they must have asked her where she would be for Christmas...
She said, "I'll probably be here and my daughter will be where ever I am "....
I was... and I continued to be there, leaving her side only hours before she passed away in January....
I will be there again tomorrow as we celebrate her spirit....

Thomas Wolfe said that you can't go home again....
Mom isn't there anymore ... the house... the ranch where I grew up,
everything is gone or different...
I'm keeping that "home" in my heart now ...
for this will be the last time that I ever go back to that place I knew as "home"...
Home is, from now on, where I am, not the place I came from...

This is the time of year we all want to be home... but, as we get older,
the home we knew no longer exists...
I feel blessed that I have a house that I "share" with my cat family ...
a church that is "home" and a "family" of friends who are very special to me...
Because of that, I can move on without regrets...
Mom would have completely understood that...
and she would have been pleased...

Tomorrow, I'll be "home", for the last time...
I'll be there as we celebrate Moms' life ...
and so will she...
Then, I will get back in my car and come home...
Here, to the place where I belong...