THERE'S NO PLACE LIKE HOME

I feel inspired to write about ‘home’ today.  I've recently returned to Canada from a much needed six months, living in solitude on an acreage in Washington State.  Thanks to my Earth Angel Bobbie who synchronistically re-entered my life after thirty years and happened to need a ‘house sitter’ for the winter.  We both called the town of Cobalt in Northern Ontario 'home' as young girls. 

This past spring weekend, I found myself visiting Jasper Park in beautiful sunny Alberta, surrounded by the snow covered Rocky Mountains, turquoise green water, and local wildlife (I am referring to ACTUAL animals here not people ;-)).  I was reunited with some of the most REAL people who call the town of Norman Wells in the Northwest Territories, 'home'. Some of us go back thirty years, some only twenty, and I see so very clearly now, what a beautiful and rare gift this is.  I used to assume everyone had this kind of connection to community and I took it for granted.  Living in a small town most of one’s life, especially an isolated one in the Arctic, you create a common bond with people and these bonds feel like ‘home’ to me now more than ever.  Most people think of ‘home’ as a house or apartment, but I no longer do.  Home is in my heart.

I’ve been gypsy’ing around place to place for over three years now.  I left the life I knew in Canada's Arctic, one of familiarity, security and all things material, in order to ‘find myself’ (for lack of better words) and my soul's calling.  Much like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz, I’ve been following the yellow brick road (signs and synchronicities) that Creator has laid out for me and as I have learned from experience (not from a book, or a workshop, or a psychic) that when I am at home within myself, then I am at home wherever I happen to be.  It hasn’t been this way my whole life and certainly wasn’t this way as I started out on my soul searching adventure, however I have finally come to a place where I can feel at home pretty much anywhere/anytime.  I can be at home by myself or in a crowd, on a plane or a bus, in the wilderness or in the city, when I have twenty dollars to my name or two thousand (although it's been many moons since I've actually had many dollars all at the same time!!  That's a whole different blog topic - one I'll call 'Money Doesn't Buy Happiness and I'm Living Proof!!). 

This lifestyle I have chosen the past few years, has found me experiencing with many different people and families, and living and sleeping in some pretty crazy places.…on floors, on the ground, in people’s spare rooms, in tents, in divey hotels and in luxury accommodations.  I have experienced firsthand ‘no matter where you go, there you are’ as I’d noticed myself feeling happy in some of the most humble living conditions, and experiencing deep inner struggle and depression in some of the most beautiful locations on this Earth. Having lived and observed that part of my journey, showed me that if I wanted to find my true self, I needed to look within and do the 'work' which I have to tell you can be a scary process.  Leaving my comfort zone where everyone knew my name and who I was and what I did, to go out into the world where no one knew my name or who I was or what I did was the most vulnerable I’d ever allowed myself to be, but it was the way for me to find my way back to my true self.  This journey to self-awarenesss has definitely been worth it, especially now that I can look back from this point in my life knowing who I am.  I can truly say I'm ‘home’.

This past weekend, it was like I could see how my life had come full circle, as some of my NWT homeys Barb-napped me from Edmonton to go on a road trip to Jasper, Alberta where other people from my hometown in the North, were gathering for a wedding.  We are a community of people who call the same territory and town, ‘home’.  We are like a very large family.  We don’t always get along with each other but we look after each other as a community when the chips are down.  No questions asked.  Some of us have thrown dirt at others.  Some of us have been hit with that dirt, and we all are quite aware of each other’s dirt.  I sometimes think that dirt is what keeps us ‘real’. When I say 'real' I mean just that...not perfect, but real.  Having left my physical 'home' a few years ago, as I set out to find my inner 'home', I was always aware that I had these people and this place as a foundation. I know where I come from and I am proud to call the towns of Cobalt and Norman Wells, 'home'.

It’s interesting what they say about hindsight and it being 20/20.  Time is the one thing that has to pass in order to have it.  Some people aren’t fond of the years passing as the numbers that define our age climb higher, but one of the gifts we are granted in that process, is hindsight.   Thirty years have now passed since this young naïve (and badass) teenager left the small town of Cobalt in Northern Ontario and move to Norman Wells, Northwest Territories, and I finally have 20/20 vision!  Re-connecting with old familiar faces this past weekend, laughing and sharing old stories, seeing the kids and how they've grown, I realized how truly connected we all are and will remain to be no matter where we are physically in the world.  That's some amazing wind under one's wings!

I can see now how my life has come full circle from the day I left Cobalt as a girl, and from the day I left the NWT a few years ago, to go on a walk about.  Not only did I experience hindsight this past weekend, I ‘felt’ it.  It felt like ‘home’, and everybody knows HOME is where the heart is.  I am truly blessed and want to shout it from the roof tops!!  

This coming weekend, my poem 'Spirit of Cobalt' will be read

at the Spring Pulse Poetry Festival in Cobalt....