Homesick

(What I miss about home)


After my brief stint at home for Christmas vacation I'm really in nature withdrawal. I just want to be outside surrounded by trees and snow. I miss the silence you find in the bush and the sharp, crisp air that invigourates you. I miss watching the light fade to blue and finally black and then the saturation of stars that fill the sky. I miss being able to photograph it all.

I know I just have to be patient and next week-end I'll be away at a cabin in the middle of nowhere. I can't wait to be able to toast marshmallows over a fire and to just lay staring up at the stars. I miss the smell of pine and the crunch of snow underfoot. I hope this getaway will provide lots of photographic opportunity.

How lucky is Kris to have all of that at his doorstep every day? Maybe I've been deluding myself all this time thinking that I could push away the memory of all these things. I thought that there was some way I could bury it deep enough that I wouldn't miss it on a daily basis. I was wrong. It is impossible to forget.

I know that no matter what life brings me I will never fully be a big city girl. If I forget this piece of my life I am forgetting a part of myself and I don't want to do that anymore. I think that these two warring parts of myself can learn to co-exist. I can say that I have learned to appreciate the city for it's beauty and I can still remember the country.

It's been an inner struggle for me to try and bridge the gap between my two worlds. My friends at home put down T.O. for it's crowdedness, lack of green space and excess pollution. My friends here put down T.B. for it's remoteness, closed-mindedness, hickness and lack of opportunity and amenities. I'm caught in the middle liking many things about both places. I cannot write off either one. One is always going to be my home and the other is my adopted home, which in many ways has accepted me more than my actual home ever did.

I've learned I can get by in both places. I have a resilence that allows me to change and adapt to either. I can be both the big city girl and the country girl. Most of all I think I've learned that I can see beauty in the world in places some people cannot. All of it has value and neither place can be discounted. Both have changed me irrevocably.

If I'm to ever find a boyfriend/husband/partner he is going to have to understand my need for both places. He may not agree with one of them but he will have to understand that neither piece can be cut out of me. To love me, would mean to love the part of me that is devoted to T.B. I couldn't be with someone who was constantly putting it down or unwilling to go there. Maybe it is a lot to ask but that is just something I'm not willing to compromise on.

Yesterday Auntie Carol came over and she gave me a spider plant. She thought I needed some cheering up after I got the disconcerting news about my Mom. Mom is ok at the moment. Don't know if there is a problem but I will have to wait till next week to find out. In the meantime she is being a horrible patient doing all the things she shouldn't be doing all because she can't sit still. She is just as stubborn as Dziadziu was.

My parents want me to come home for a week-end or so while they are in NZ so I can check on Babcia. We know that Krysta won't be on that as she should be. I'm ok with it cause it just means more time at home sweet home.