“What if God were one of us, Just a slob like one of us
Just a stranger on the bus, Tryin’ to make his way home?
Like back to heaven all alone …….” Joan Osbourne
Last week this song popped into my head. I hadn't heard it in forever - it came out in 1995 and I’m not sure if I’ve heard it in the last two decades. But here it was, in my head, stuck in “Repeat” and me, singing in my indoor voice, humming it out loud, knowing every note and word. And it brought me to thinking about home, my home, at the moment not really mine, and how, for most of my life I have moved from place to place way more times than being in any one place. Really.
When I recount my moves over the years, there are only two places in my entire life that I have resided for any length of time; my childhood home where we moved into when I was 5, left when I was 18 and the home in New Jersey where I lived for seventeen years; the childhood home I couldn’t leave soon enough, the Warren home being my only true home of my adult life, which I walked away from in a desperate move to align myself physically and materially to the free fall that I was experiencing emotionally and spiritually. (another story)
The rest of the years between those two, which were thirty or so, were spent moving from place to place, mostly rentals, which I was in for a year or maybe two and one condo that I owned and lived in for five years, or staying with friends who graciously opened their homes and families to me but always gave me a good reason to leave, not wanting to overstay my welcome. And so I took a deep dive and asked myself why was I such a wanderer, how come I have never really stayed in any one place for any length of time?
Of course when you ask questions you are truly seeking answers to, you do eventually get them. And so I thought about what “home” means to me and why, right now the one I dwell in is not. Warren was where I put my heart and soul into making it mine, fixing each room, a blank canvas. It was where I opened myself to life and a more integrated spiritual life. It is where I knew family again, experienced true and unconditional love, took care of my “little boy” Kohls and connected with all of my beautiful soul sisters and brothers who continue to bless me along this journey. It was the best of times and my most challenging of times and stretched me in ways I never could have imagined. And when I was living elsewhere, I remember going to my sister and her companion’s home up North or to my dear friends homes all over the country and walking into that “family”, that love and connection, totally getting that temporary fix, the one I needed.
So I have come to realize that the reason I am not in a place I would either call or feel as “home”, is because having lost everything, I haven’t been willing to open myself up, to be vulnerable again to fully embrace my life, new love and commitment and create a new home for myself…….. And how does that make me feel? Of course I am crying; maybe for the release to finally let go of what came before and crying for the hope that I now understand what has been holding me back.
And so when we are finally let out of our current “lock down”, to start our lives anew, I hope that the divine has a plan for me, because I am ready, or at least ready to try …….
Are you tryin’ to make your way home?
