A writing prompt this morning said: “Where are you from…” Here is what came out…

When I was but a tiny girl, I was from the womb of my mother. As time marched on- as it is so wont to do – I came from many places. My heart always lived in one location but my physical self was from quite another. I remember, clearly, walking down the hallway of my grandparent’s home and seeing myself in the full length mirror, but what I saw was not flesh and bones, but a soul. I saw a shimmery light and a message. I know that sounds crazy, but it’s the honest truth. The message is still waiting to reveal itself to me, but I believe it spoke to and from my sense of place. I also believe that my faith – no pun intended- was cemented in that moment.

I grew up in a small, middle class farm town in the heart of central Massachusetts. There was farm land behind us and the mooing of cows was often as clear as the stars in the sky. One day, the cows were replaced with large machines and a development was soon erected behind our home. Too young to understand the implications, I was simply happy to have new neighbors. That is, until the day when Mr. Anderson decided that greasing our swing set was a good idea. He never liked us kids. There were a gang of us (likely 8 or 9 on any given day) and we were loud and liked to play as kids’ do. We were not obnoxious or unruly or even mean, but he disliked us anyway. Or maybe he disliked what we stood for or our parents. I don’t know. All I do know is that one day our swing set was covered in grease. I discovered this fact while attempting a flip on the bars and landing on my back instead. My hands came away black and slimy. I ran to tell my folks. My dad – a quiet person who did his level best to avoid confrontation, often to his detriment – used a word I knew meant trouble. “Horse feathers,” he hollered. “I am going to go find that man!” And he did, by phone in my memory, but it could have been over the back fence. We had a lot of conversations over that back fence. I was eating grapes – green ones – when Mr. Anderson turned up on our back deck and the fighting ensued. I cannot remember who was yelling at whom, but I could smell the alcohol. Since neither of my parent’s drank in my presence, I determined it must have been Mr. Anderson who was guilty. Soon enough he left the yard and we set about washing the swing set.

I don’t know why this sticks in my head. Perhaps because I thought I lived an idyllic life out in the country; one filled with afternoons of touch football with the boys next door or sunning myself on the pool deck with a cat on my chest. My heart was always at home with the animals. I can still see each cat as they paraded through my life – one neighbor remarked that we had more cats come through our house to their death than most had spiders. This concerned me, but thinking about it – she was right. There were Patches and Cinnamon, and Pepper and Fluffy and so many more. They all came in by way of my mother when my father was not at home, and they all left to “go to the farm” or from an uncommon disease like distemper. It made me happy that so many of my beloveds went to “the farm” as I knew one day I, too, would live there. It wasn’t until I was much older that I understood where they really went. Death was never discussed behind our doors.

You think I’m kidding? I’m not. Let’s fast forward many years – likely near to 15 – and I am engaged to a young man who has lost his father to heart disease at the ripe old age of 10 and is now receiving a phone call that his brother has died. My mother –ever afraid of death – escorts him to his car, refuses me the ability to get in (yes, I allowed her this power), and sends him off to find his family. I am not allowed to attend the funeral as it would be too sad. I justified this in my heart because I was in love with someone else anyway…