Home

I had it pulled up for weeks, the Zillow page for this house I have never seen, never visited. This home that once belonged to other people, but now sat empty, waiting. It was not my home, but now it is home, not for me, but for my people.

My parents made it known some years ago that they did not, could not, plan to stay in my teenage home forever. (Even that was not home for all of my childhood, but it was the only home we lived in long enough for me to consider it home, the only home my parents ever bought, the only home my parents ever paid off, the only home my parents owned.) They considered selling for a while, and tried, but to no avail. Then suddenly, all the pieces fell into place. They got a buyer for their house. They moved their stuff east. They went searching, and before I knew it, this house was on my phone screen, this new home for my people.

After over 25 years of my parents being in one place, it is strange to think of this new house as belonging to my parents. Their things were not in it yet. Technically, they had yet to take possession, but it was theirs, or would be theirs. Keeping the house photo up on my phone helped my brains start accepting that. 

Change is hard. I still do not see this new state as my parents' home. I see it as my brother's home. I still have not quite grasped the fact that my parents will now be two days away from me. I am used to driving north for two hours and being at their doorstep. This new house on my screen looked empty, foreign, but change happens in stages, so I left the house up, each time I saw it, reminding myself that this is now a home, not for me, but where my people will be.

Ultimately, home is not a place. It is not the old house, or this new one. It is where my heart is, and my heart is with my people, wherever they may be. Near or far, a piece of my heart goes where they are, and maybe that's part of the reason I kept looking at this house on my screen, because a part of me was moving here, not physically, but mentally and emotionally. My family is my home, and my heart moves with them,  to this house, and perhaps to another and another, until one day we all make our forever home with Jesus.