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As I write this I am on way from Seattle to Bahrain via Amsterdam, on my way back to work from my second leave. After Bahrain I will take a cab into Saudi Arabia and get to my little apartment at about 2 am. It’s different now flying to the other side of the world compared to the first time I went over there six months ago … and not just because I’m in coach instead of first class. It’s different because there aren’t many surprises this time. The field of the unknown is much smaller and so is the excitement. Maddy (my 5 year old daughter) is starting to see the pattern, and almost seems to be getting used to it. We sat in the kitchen today and hugged each other. She felt my chin hair and asked why I didn’t shave my beard this time. She is so perceptive. The last two times I left I had a clean-shaven face. I wonder if she now associates my clean face with me leaving. She touched my nose with hers and then put her cheek next to mine and said “Home Sweet Home”. I had explained this new term for her when I used it earlier in the day. I said that it just meant that home was pretty sweet to me, ...like Agave Nectar … and she said “in warm milk” … I said “with whipped cream on top” … and so on until we had completed the recipe to her latest passion she calls “hot milk”; something my wife has been making for her lately. I had tried to make it a few times, but would always mess up on a detail or two. “But mom always gives me a bit of whipped cream to put in my mouth before she puts it away”. “Oops,” I would say as I opened the fridge and pulled the whipped cream back out.

Part of what makes home, “home” is more than just a place. For many of us it’s routine. This is certainly true for Maddy. This routine was difficult to adjust to when I first got back. It took me about a week to get out of my independent “bachelor” mindset and blend in. We spent more time getting in each other’s way. Like the warm up session before a symphony, there was a lot of dissonance. It was a shame the concert itself wasn’t much longer than the tuning of the instruments.

We went on a few short trips while I was home, but what Maddy missed most was the routines. Once we forgot to bring a CD set that had “Charlotte’s Web” on it read by the author. This is what she listens to when she winds down to get ready for bed. She’s probably listened to it 50 times by now. Nothing else will do. It makes her feel at home, I think. (I wonder if this is where OCD comes from … some sort of desire to recreate the familiar … to bring back a sense of home.)

Technology has come so far now that I am able to talk endlessly with Nikki and Maddy and even look at them and catch all the subtle facial expressions that do much to enhance communication, while I’m at the opposite side of the world. But I can’t touch them. I won’t be surprised if even that will be somehow possible in the future in some sort of virtual way, but I will miss it now. I still smell Maddy’s drool from when I kissed her cheek goodbye as she slept in her car seat in front of the airport. Images come to mind from my brief 2 ½ weeks at home. I still remember seeing a flash of my own boyhood face in the rear view mirror when I watched her smile to herself while she looked out the car window in some sort of wistful, quiet, daydream. The feeling and smell will soon fade and I know I’ll miss it. The images will be different when I come back. She will be older then, and a bit more of the innocence will be gone...

I have never thought of myself a “homebody”. Since I’ve had such a nomadic life there is no place on this earth I can honestly call home. But I’m realizing there is something other than a place that calls me back to itself. The invaded personal space; the sparse time to myself; the constant interruptions; the month-old goldfish crackers in the car seat …it’s all home. And even though it always takes time to adjust to it, and it never is completely perfect, I miss it horribly right now … and I haven’t even been away from it for a day.