Home.

I’ve been thinking about the concept of home lately. I have committed to an art project for the ArtHouse Co-op in Brooklyn, NY. Their annual Sketchbook Project asks artists to fill up a standard Moleskine sketchbook with art, words, and whatever creativity expounds around a specific theme. My sketchbook theme was chosen randomly — “…you’d be home by now.” I like it. The theme lends itself to humor and introspection with a twinge of regret or wandering. For me, it explores the question of “if” and of how we view the journey to home.

As I’ve been thinking and sketching for the project, I’ve settled on the idea that we really take “home” with us. Whether it’s mental snapshots of a particular house, memories of sights and sounds and smells we treasure, conversations with friends or foes we knew at different times in our lives, the feeling of ownership at claiming our own space, the joy of building a nest and so on. We find our “home” in many places. And while some of them are associated with structures, it’s often our own interpretations and feelings about those spaces rather than the sheetrock and glazing that enclose them.

I lived in the same house from the time I was a baby until I left to attend college. I can still see the wallpaper my mother hung, the arrangement of the furniture, the placement of treasured items in my room. The place my Mom & Dad created has colored my expectations of my own home. I am thankful for the sense of togetherness my parents created in that space. For the sense of celebration that permeated it, even on regular Tuesdays and Wednesdays. I’m thankful for the creativity exhibited there that fueled so much of my life and work today. I’m thankful for the communication, “you matter” that occurred there each day. My parents no longer live in that house or that town, but the “home” created there has an indelible place in my spirit. It has remained my benchmark for all that is normal. It became what I look for and seek to build in my own home.

As I go about my days of mothering, I’m so grateful for the privilege of creating a home for my little ones. The opportunity to build that place that will serve as THEIR benchmark is such a blessing–and a huge responsibility. I remember after Little Drummer Boy was born, I clearly remember having the realization, “I CAN NOT get this wrong.” I wanted to live each moment with the long-term in mind, reminded of the reality that little moments string together day after day to form my children’s lasting impressions of home. Their expectations of how family should be. Their assumptions about love and celebration and habits and responsibilities and all the other daily things that make a life. It makes me take greater care with the daily and with the unconscious habits I allow to continue within these walls, knowing they become unconsious expectations for their future lives.

Beyond the blessing of feathering nests, there is another “home” I’m recognizing, and one I’m hoping LDB, Bug and Baby Girl will find. We are each created with purpose and gifts that can be used to bless in this world. Life has a way of distracting and deceiving and wooing us outside of ourselves and those gifts. The view we have of ourselves can become unrecogizable to that person we really are–who we were made to be. The realities of what really makes our heart beat at its strongest can become clouded. In times of wandering and wondering, the old adage “home is where the heart is” rings true.

Wherever my heart finds a resting place becomes home. Wherever my heart breathes in a clear space becomes home. Wherever I find my joy and fulfillment becomes home. Wherever I can give unencumbered. Wherever I can give with the full weight of support urging me forward becomes home. That “home” may be defined differently for each of us, but we can rest assured that our heart knows it. Our heart can recognize it. Our heart seeks it. Our heart wants to be in that place where we can be ALL of what we’re made to be. I’m thankful for that homing device built inside us. The one that helps us find our way through countless turns. To ourselves. At home.

Thanksgiving.

Deciding whether to post my usual 12 Days of Thanksgiving series this year was an arduous task. I’m not exactly sure why. The dates seemed to sneak up on me. I can’t believe how quickly the last few months have flown by. It’s always interesting to me how the passage of time flies or creeps, and I suppose part of the pursuit of EyeJunkie is an attempt to slow it down to a series of continual snapshots I can more easily take in.

Beyond the fast pace of experiences that seems to have overtaken my mind over the last few months, I think my real dilema in creating a series of Thanksgiving posts has been a sort of reluctance to explore the topic. I wasn’t sure I really had the mental space to do it justice this year. You may have gleaned from my rather infrequent posts recently that this time of transition in my life has been almost an overload to my spirit, one in which I’ve done a lot of soul-searching. That soul-searching sometimes involves mind-wandering and spirit-wandering, evaluating where I’ve been and imagining where I might be going. Wandering leads to questioning, and questioning is sometimes a gratitude killer.

However, the concept of “3rd annual” is a very powerful encouragement for a girl like me. I place so much stock in traditions that the mere thought of having celebrated the 12 Days of Thanksgiving for the last two years was a powerful enticement to make the commitment this year too. SO… I’m taking the plunge. Today begins the 3rd Annual 12 Days of Thanksgiving posting series at EyeJunkie. Since I’ve noticed my own scattered quality lately as well as the whole soul-searching, gratitude-challenged penchant I mentioned earlier, I thought I needed a little boost for topic ideas. This year, I’m using each of the letters in the word “thanksgiving” as thought-starting catalysts for sharing some of the things blessing me at the moment. They may not be the typical things, but they are realities and ideas that are impressing on me just how big this life is, and how much I DON’T want to miss it.

You see, through the process of deciding whether I really wanted to focus my attention on Thanksgiving for twelve days straight, I’ve realized once again how very central gratitude is to living a deliberate life. How essential it is to a life aware. At least a positive life aware. To be engaged in your own life in any meaningful way requires paying attention to what’s there. It requires looking with intention (even intently) at the things filling up that life and pulling from them the good, the bad, the ugly, the beautiful–whatever differentiates between living and mere existence.

The dictionary defines “thanksgiving” as the “grateful acknowledgement of benefits or favors.” Grateful acknowledgement. Awareness is the prerequisite to acknowledgement. We can’t recognize blessings until we commit to seeing them–really seeing them. So, as I begin this 12-day journey toward Thanksgiving Day, even though I’ve been mired in reluctance, I find that I’m finally eager to seek out blessings and once again cultivate a grateful heart.

I’m reminded of a story in the biblical book of Genesis. A story in the life of Jacob. He found himself at a moment of transition–moving from the life he’d come to know and one of uncertainty. A moment of wandering. A moment of facing his past and his future.  Alone at night, he wrestled with an angel until daybreak. When it was clear the new day of decision and action had arrived–the next day–he spoke to the angel. “I will not let you go unless you bless me.” Though it came through wrestling, he received his blessing that day. And he walked away battered, but with a new confidence for the journey.

I hope you’ll join me for these twelve days. Perhaps thanksgiving will require a little wrestling to find the blessing. But, the blessing is there nonetheless. Let’s don’t let go until we see it.

“Oh give thanks to the Lord, for He is good, for His mercy is everlasting. For He has satisfied the thirsty soul, and the hungry soul He has filled with good.”

(psalm 107: 1,9)

As I’ve been thinking through a summary of this year’s Thanksgiving experiment, I’ve realized that thoughts have not come as easily as they did in the 2008 rendition. Some years are just like that. Some days. Last year, my mind was hopping with post ideas. I was still high on the joy of a new Baby Girl, and one day’s post produced a whole list of other ideas for the next. This year, thanksgiving thoughts have not come as freely. The process has been a little more labored, and it’s required more discipline to fulfill my commitment of posting on twelve consecutive days.

Discipline. What an ugly word. It implies actual work, actual intention, actual effort, actual choice.

It’s so easy to think about giving thanks in terms of circumstances. And circumstances can be challenging. This year has been hard for our family. In some ways it carries a sense of loss. And loss does not readily co-exist with gratitude.

In February, my father (Paw-T) suffered a fairly severe stroke. As severe strokes go, it happened in the best way possible, and he has been recovering nicely. Still, it represented the loss of some skills, the loss of a carefree way of life, the loss of comfort, the loss of the familiar, and I suppose the loss of my last “fragments of childhood” as I wrote at the time.

This summer, for finanical reasons, Quiver decided to close down the small landscape design business he’s had for the last four years. The challenge of finding a job to use his incredible design and construction skills has been difficult in these times, and he has been so diligent and humble in the process. Still, it represented the loss of his dream (at least temporarily), the loss of his control over a very full “Daddy” schedule, and I suppose the loss of some confidence in his own decisions.

With the weight of loss, how can I find a way to be grateful?

As I’ve forced myself to look at that question in black and white as opposed to in the hazy abstract of my mind, I realize it’s shamefully easy. For, these things are true:

The loss is not as great as some have experienced this year.

Dad can walk. Dad can speak. Dad can think. My parents can spend the night with us and keep their grandchildren on a day like today. They can travel with us to the zoo. They can laugh. We can visit the farm and enjoy it’s carefree experiences. We have them.

Quiver has work. He can play despite the stress. He can give baths at night and read stories. We have a home we enjoy. Our gifts are vibrant. They are healthy and growing–laughing and singing and dancing. We are here. We are alive. We are together.

We are blessed. And to recognize blessing is perhaps the most treasured of disciplines. Yes, there’s that ugly word again. As I sum up these 12 Days, I’m not at the same uninhibited place of joy I was last year. But, I AM at a place of joy–once again at a deeper, more tested and, therefore, richer place of joy. And I find it’s very natural to say “thank you”– to God, to one another, to new friends, to old ones, even to loss. The lesson of these 12 Days:

A thankful heart is a discipline that can flourish independent of circumstances.

Welcome to the special souped up Thanksgiving issue of The Tuesday Ten Twenty-Five! It’s a quick rundown of 25 little (or big) things–silly and profound–that I’m in love with this Thanksgiving season. By all means, enjoy yourselves.

1. Little Drummer Boy–your remarkable storytelling and trips to the “hug store”

2. Squiggle Bug–your unquenched spirit and tender heart

3. Baby Girl–your infectious smile and undaunted joy

4. Quiver–your steadfast hope, your gentleness and truth

5. Hershey’s chocolate bars

6. Big piles of leaves–and watching boys jump in them

7. Attention–giving and getting it

8. Kermit, the trusty laptop–I think I love you

9. Bedtime stories

10. The chance to make something right

11. Nacho cheese Doritoes–yep, still thankful for those

12. Books

13. Realizing it’s not as late as you thought it was

14. A Sonic Mocha Chip Java Cooler–saves many a frustrating moment

15. A good night’s sleep

16. Lamps and their ambient light

17. Old friends–the continuing gift of yourself after all this time

18. The Dave Matthews Band–just sayin’

19. “Coincidence”

20. Old issues of Dwell magazine–and by old I mean the ones from the last two months I haven’t gotten to

21. The quiet hours after 10pm

22. Clean, white, unlined paper

23. The Canon PowerShot–wowza!

24. Candy Corn–and doling it out before dinner

24. Honest conversation

25. The astounding and humbling power of words