My brother-in-law had cancer. It was about 12 or 13 years ago, and he almost died from it. He had Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma. His and my sister’s story is one for the ages. Truly. They have seen it all and been through all of the ringers that life has to offer. They were in their mid and early twenties when he was diagnosed. That whole story is worth telling but they have told it many times so I will leave it to them. I just want to point out one mystifying thing that we learned through all of his medical procedures.
He had to have a bone marrow transplant. He lived at the cancer center for a long time while he was being treated. Because of the nature of his cancer they were actually able to use his own Bone Marrow to give him the transplant. Don’t ask me how that works cause I don’t know. Haha. I am not a medical professional. The really incredible thing is that they removed the cells from his bone and they store it externally while they give him the harsh medicine, (radiation, maybe?) that kills his existing Bone Marrow. Then when they put his own cells back into his body the removed cells act like a homing station. Every single cell that has been removed and stored returns exactly to where it came from. It goes home. This gives his Bone Marrow the best chance of regenerating since it is literally his and it settles right back to where it came from as if it never left.
He has been cancer free now for over a decade.
One of my favorite books is “The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger. It’s a magical realism romance about a man who has a chromosomal abnormality that makes him travel through time. He travels to places that are important to his own story. He sees his mother get killed in a car accident dozens of times. He goes to towns and cities that become significant to him even if he doesn’t understand why. He visits this particular meadow in Upstate New York over and over because it happens to be the home of his future wife. He meets her when she is a little girl. The way his doctors describe his travel locations is that he is drawn back to “big events” in his life and he travels to those places at different moments in time. Homing stations.
I am spending this month in Colorado and Utah. The places that I grew up and formed me as a human being. When I come out west I breathe just a fraction deeper than I do when I am in Nashville. Even though I have called Tennessee home now for almost 15 years, I still have roots in these places I also call home. The sky is so big out here. You can see so far without thousands of trees blocking your view. The mountains rise above any of the landscape in your eyeline that would otherwise impede your view anyway. The sky is so blue and the clouds are so white. It’s dry and barely rains. The sun shines every single day that we are here. Like summer should be.
(I took this photo in Boulder, Colorado last week)
In a few weeks I will get to dig my toes and feet into the sand underneath the grand Arches of Moab, Utah and ground myself in the earth in a way that I just isn’t the same anywhere else.
I was talking to my sister last night about homesickness. How as an adult when I feel homesick it’s mostly for a certain person. My kids, my partner, my siblings, my parents, my grandparents, my friends and so on. But I also feel homesick for these places. The High Deserts and mountain roads that a much younger version of myself roamed for decades. The places that provided the backdrop for my younger formative years. The echoes of the Stefanie that I was before I took on the roles of Mother and Wife. The Me that was before the Me that is. I feel the sense of nostalgia that comes in knowing that I can never have that back in the same way. The landscape, people and versions of myself are different every single year. But I do get a groundedness that fuels me up for the next 11 months living in the South and thousands of miles away from most of my people. The ones who share my DNA.
I recently had a Tarot Reading for the first time ever. It was so much fun, and I got a lot out of it. One of the things she said to me was that I have a strong desire to return home. She also said, “While you can never really go back home, you are looking for something that will help you feel close to some nice memories.” I do understand that the longing for home that I experience in a deep way is one that will really never go away. But it is a longing that quiets down when I am in the presence of the people who make me feel safe and loved. Even amidst the complexities of family relationships, I know I am loved.
Home.
It’s an ever-changing and fluid concept that can really mean so many different things. These places, to me, are a home that I will be drawn to for the rest of my life. Like The Time Traveler, I will keep coming back to these places and feeling a part of myself open up that stays shut while I am away. I cannot help but be drawn back on a cellular level to these dusty fields, deserts and mountains that shape the pieces of who I am.
My heart overflows with love, longing and gratitude that these places exist, and I get to be in them.
Alive and well.
Home.
Sending love to you out there in the ether,
Stef
A song that describes the tender things in life that we love and the longing for them when we are away.