one long week

Lying on the floor of my grandma's sitting room, it's difficult to believe that I've only been home for a week.

What a week it has been---seeing my entire dad's side of the family, some of them for the first time in 10 months, hanging out with a few of my best friends for the first time since Christmas, and singing daily in my favorite practice room back at wellesley.

Life returns so easily to the patterns of places and people once practiced.

I've been lying here, listening first to the Reinecke flute sonata and then some miles davis, and now bon iver on my grandma's incredible stereo system. The music carries me through time and space and resonates with the strangeness of everything right now.

Strange: to have returned at once so much the same, yet so different, to the place that is supposed to know me best. Home. It is so good to be here, rejuvenating, but I can't shake off this longing for other places and for friends that will now be referred to as "old friends", "dear friends", "missed friends". Not one can be replaced---small corners of my heart are going to be lacking their smiles and warmth.

I suppose it will always be like this, constant comings and goings. I'll turn into a guesthouse, peaceful and friendly, with simple food and good wine. Friends and loved ones will enter my open door and we'll share time and music. But no one can stay forever, and those gone will always be missed until they can come again to visit. No wonder people grow old and weary from the burdens of hearts, so many comings and goings, hellos and good-byes. First embraces, and final ones.

My luggage may have been under the weight limit, but I'm lucky they didn't ask me up on the scale at the airport check-in. I flew home with a heart heavier than I've ever known--full of memories, love, joy,  sadness, even a little pain, hopes, and new dreams. I won't lug it around forever, so I'll try to pour it into my journals, songs, and art of these precious summer months. Plus I'll need to fit into some nice audition and concert dresses soon, so this big swollen heart is going to have to shapen up.

-lab