This past week, I found myself on the road again. My family and I took an emergency road trip to my husband’s home town. Though, not a pleasant reason to travel, I suddenly remembered how much I like the actual process of traveling.
When I was a kid, we traveled a lot My parents being from the Czech Republic, we went to Europe often. We also moved a bunch, four new houses in three different states by the time I was ten!
Though, hectic at times, I learned to enjoy the process of going from one place to another. I wasn’t always thrilled about the destinations but I sure did like getting there. The plane trips were filled with people watching, making camp in foreign airports and being immersed in different cultures, languages and smells.
Moving from one state to the next, I became an expert real estate agent at a very young age. My parents would share the real estate pages with me, some general pricing guidelines and off I would go, circling homes and starring the ones I really wanted to see.
All this travel brought an education all its own but nothing compares to the meditative state I have come to appreciate during a road trip. As a kid, traveling west in the backseat of the family truckster was not that enjoyable but once I got old enough to drive, everything changed
As a teen-ager, it was all about the radio. Listening to tunes and heading somewhere, anywhere, back and forth from college with a car load of friends, just the ticket As I got older, my husband and I would travel to see each other and then eventually settle down together in a brand new state, unknown to either one of us.
Most recently, I find, I like nothing more than the open road, me behind the wheel and utter silence. It allows me the time to catch up with myself. Everything I haven’t had time to think about or process just waiting in the wings ready to unfold. It’s a kind of unraveling of ideas, thoughts and impressions. Nothing too heavy, just me and myself having a chat of sorts.
One thing, however, has remained constant in all the years I’ve been on the road. I never forget to be grateful for the home I have at the moment. This particular home I’ve had for almost 20 years but it makes no difference because if I’ve learned nothing else, I’ve learned that a home is not a place or destination but a sense of being.
How about you? Where or when do you feel most at home, connected or grateful? Is there a connection between your outside and inside home? How so?
Vera Snow is an author, spiritual director, group facilitator, wife and mother of identical twins. She has a BA in journalism, MA in human development and certified as a spiritual director via Sacred Ground Center for Spirituality, www.sacredgroundspirit.org. Her work is about facilitating other's awareness of God in their everyday lives. You can read more about Vera and her work at www.verasnow.com or subscribe to her blog: www.verasnow.blogspot.com.