"Home is where the heart can laugh without shyness. Home is where the heart's tears can dry at their own pace." Vernon Baker
Our plane touches down at one AM, and I text my best friend of 28 years, "We landed thirty minutes early. Colorado tail wind!" My children, unaccustomed to air travel, do not understand why planes take so long to unload. "It's hot. Why aren't these people moving?" My five-year old's Thomas the Train blanket is wound around his head like a turban, his eyes glazed with exhaustion. Wedged between his eleven-year-old sister and fourteen-year-old brother, he is repeatedly conked in the head by their carry-ons.
Leaning in, I smell my daughter's freshly washed hair and wish I could scoop them all into bed. They are worn out, ready for cool sheets and a long sleep. But at the moment, threats are in order. We must get off the plane without incident and I've long run out of Skittles and other believable bribes. They are vying for precious space in the aisle, shoving and arguing. "Move over, idiot, I need to stretch my legs." All but the little one, who leans his head against my belly, exhausted and flushed.
The stewardess looks on unperturbed from her jump seat, calmly sipping a diet Dr. Pepper and tapping away on an iPad. How easily she ignores the mass of sweaty, irritated passengers. "Any chance you could turn on the AC?" With a tight-lipped smile in my general direction, she flashes the universal screw you look of disdain and mutters, "I'll phone the flight deck and see what I can do."
That would be advisable. Before the woman in 26B has a panic attack. She's complaining loudly, to no one in particular, that she can't control her core temperature because she had her ovaries and uterus removed four days prior. And, she shouldn't have ordered the caramel mocha because dairy always gives her gas. It is now easily one hundred and ten degrees in the cabin. Apparently they are hatching chicks on the plane.
Ten lifetimes later, we emerge into the fluorescent coolness of the nearly deserted airport, and zig zag towards our Metro Car. Ground transportation, God bless you. In an hour, we'll be at my best friend's childhood home and for six days, we will swim in her pool, wake to blueberry pancakes, eggs, and bacon and watch her parents dote on all of our children, her two tiny ones, and my three medium.
Her home had been my second since childhood. When my parents died, her mother and father stepped up, generous anchors offering a place of refuge. They knew I would not last long without a repository for memories, a nest to fly home to when my own felt hollow and cold.
From memory, I tell the driver the address. Forty-five minutes, if he drives quickly, and my children will be tucked under the same blankets we nestled under, two seventh grade girls giggling over boys. We'd peer out the same dark windows that cooled my forehead as I mourned the loss of my sister. My home too rank with grief to provide respite, but hers let me dream and grieve. Gave me rest, if only for a night, and kept me safe while my future rolled onward with gently lit hopes.
They are standing in the driveway, waiting. My laughter bubbles up before the car slows to a stop as I fumble in the dark for the door handle. "What took you so long?" Her mother is wearing a robe I don't remember, and Anna is doing an Irish jig while she settles the tab with the driver. We flutter around the driveway, lighting first on each other, then on each of the children in turn. "My God, who is this big grown man?" Shaking my oldest son gently by the shoulders, arms reach for my littlest. "Mason, get over here and give Babcia a hug. I'm gonna squeeze him!" Mason, wide-eyed, is willingly enfolded in the embrace of his godmother and her mother. I laugh, without hiding the tears sliding down my cheeks. "Ava, you look just like your mother. Are you hungry? Get inside, now, you're gonna get eaten alive by mosquitos! Don't forget to take your shoes off. Anna, did you make those beds?"
"Yes, Janice. I made the beds." Eyes rolled in my direction make me laugh, and Anna makes a face at her mother. "Don't pinch me. Who do you think you are? My mother?" We tumble down the stairs as quietly as we can manage, our small herd. But before I head downstairs to sleep, I pause. The kitchen is the same. There is the gleaming wooden table with the fluted white bowl in the center, where my parents ate pierogi and sauerkraut. The green wicker chair in the corner, which overlooks the garden.
Every detail of the house rises up to meet me. Cut roses on the windowsill above the kitchen sink. The antique crystal glass, holding a dozen silver spoons next to the coffee pot and a plum kuchen, which will be our breakfast. The smell; clean and warm, like baking bread and lemon oil. The piano where Anna sang and practiced for hours, the painting of an old piece of pottery, cracked along its edge. That has been reframed.
Standing alone, briefly, I hear words to a melody I was sure I'd lost. Like finding a key, hidden deep inside a pocket, one you thought you'd misplaced, I am flooded with relief. I am home, the world is ordered properly. I head slowly down the stairs to join my children and laugh for a few minutes with my friend before we all turn in, knowing full well that tonight, I will rest.