I got locked in the vineyard again this morning…

Seriously? 

What the heck?? 

Ugh…

Whenever this happens, and I get kept away from my morning hike, it sends me into a strange kind of rage that just seems wrong to me — even though it’s me that’s having the mental meltdown! This whole situation shouldn’t bother me as much as it does, but the fact is, getting locked in makes me feel trapped, and that seems to set off this panic in me that I can’t contain.

Of course, my terrific husband helped me at least get my hike in today by dropping me off near the road that leads to my trail on his way to the gym. I think he’s accepted that my sanity completely depends on my hike most days, and even though I wish I didn’t need something so specific in my day to keep me “normal,” I, too, have accepted that this is how I am right now.

But once I got rolling on my hike, [NERD ALERT] I put on a podcast that was oddly PERFECT for me today. It was a talk on being “where you are.” It was all about owning your truest sense of home and being present to where you’re from no matter where you are. 

When I was trying to think about “where I’m from,” I don’t have a very simple answer to that question. I grew up for part of my childhood in Colorado, but then during my most awkward years, my family moved to Florida. And even though I’ve technically lived in Florida longer than any other place in my life so far, the word “home” doesn’t translate when I think of that state. 

On top of that, losing both of my parents makes the word “home” difficult for me to define, I suppose. I think I used to think of home as the place where my mom and dad were, but then all of that changed, and as a result, there is no “sense of place” in my awareness attached to my parents anymore either — other than in a very spiritual way, of course.

And, as you know if you’re following The Imposition Tour posts on this blog, I haven’t had a place to really call “home” for the past 12-years or so — even though if you ask me where I live right now, I can tell you that my current residence is in Sonoma, California. But even this doesn’t feel like home to me. It feels temporary, and like any day, it won’t be where I live anymore. 

So the closest thing I have to a feeling home or a sense of place is Lou; and on an even deeper level, my truest sense of home is found in my faith.

I’m mostly OK with this reality I’ve worked into words for myself and for this blog, but I also can’t help but consider the strange irony of how trapped I felt today when I was locked in the vineyard. In a way, the thoughts I have about the idea of “home” seem to require some kind of defining boundaries or specific features that ground or lock in a sense of stability and steadfastness. But as soon as the space around me gets super defined and the boundaries of a place lock me in, I feel fearful and unnerved.

I did end up bumping into the vineyard manager on my way home from my hike, and he told me the lock just got jammed. He showed me how to un-jam it if that ever happens again — which made me so thankful. But as I walked along the well-worn path that splits through the vineyard and leads to my little cottage, I clung to the most valuable thing I learned today from that podcast:

Home is just the place where we continue to become…

As important as it is to embrace a sense of home in this life — so you can find a way to be present and to make peace with yourself and the life you’ve been living — perhaps for me, this might just be a very long and very intense season of becoming.