Aaaahhhh, home

We're home. Home. Whenever I use the phrase in relation to a place, I think of (get ready for this...) Carolyn Ingalls in the early days of Little House on the Prairie telling Charles lovingly and with starry eyes, "My home is wherever you are." And, in many ways, Carolyn was right. Home is where my husband and children are. Yet, we live the phenomena known to so many of today's Americans - the rest of our family does not live in the same city nor anywhere near where we live. And where they live is also a form of home.

In some ways, home will always be Portland, Oregon. It's hardwired in my blood (remember that post awhile back about my semi-famous ancestor?). As we drive down streets and highways, a plethora of memories erupt. There are historic associations with nearly every passing landmark:

• There's the 7-Eleven by my mom's house where I grew up. My friends used to buy me a candy bar if I'd walk there with them and use my math prowess to make sure Fran the cashier didn't rip them off.
• There's the Sellwood Bridge over the Willamette River where we spread my father-in-laws ashes. Each time we cross that bridge, we say hi to Pops...and to our dead cats, Hannah and Hobbes (that was Minky's addition). Driving over that bridge a few years ago, Minky told us he'd met Pops in heaven then he shared what Pops had told him there. Amazingly, he used phrases and words that only Pops would have used.
• There is the mall by the house where I grew up. It used to be swampland, and I remember when the mall was built. I also remember trying to sneak off the junior high bus to go shopping after school, and the militant bus driver who only let us off at the mall if we had a note or if it was our designated stop.
• On the way down from Seattle, we passed through what used to be a tiny little town that is now bursting with retail options. Some things change when you move away, and they stand out like a sore thumb because life is no longer the way you left it when you sailed away on new adventures.
• And there's the traffic and the sheer land mass of a metro area holding over 1 million people. Some things we may be used to, but I can't say we miss them.
• Of course, there are the long term friendships and the family and the people who knew you when and love you anyway. There are the stories you love to remember and the ones you'd prefer to forget. There are the moments you find yourself transferred back to the years of being the annoying little sister or to the glory days of college memories as you admit to friends that you found a paper in the storage unit entitled, "The Benefits of Being on a Fraternity Court."
• And, home, what would it be without a Starbucks on every block and a Coffee People always nearby? And the folks who work at these coffee shops know what a venti half-caf peppermint mocha should taste like. Aaaahhh, it's good to be home.