Home

Tonight, my mother looked into my father’s eyes and saw her brother. She needed to call her husband. She knew he would be awake and worried about where she was, why she wasn’t home.

My father was tired.

I tried to talk about the evening I had, and still she wanted to call, the drive they had, still she needed to call. She went to the door to leave, twisted the door lock the wrong way ‘round, the mechanism thankfully foreign to her.

I pulled a photo album, but not the family album for fear of reigniting the desire to call home, but my own. We looked through my photos, from babe to school, on through adulthood, until it was I who was lost.

I felt the tears welling up as I looked through all those seemingly bright moments from my past and remembered that I hadn’t always been happy when these photos were taken. I wasn’t happy now. I gave myself permission to look to my mother and just be her son.

She felt my pause, knew my chest was tight. She consoled me, and held me, and told me how proud she was of me. She told me that being myself was the best thing I could be, and that people could see that, feel that, and knew that, even if I didn’t.

She was soon ready to sleep, and said as much. She found home in caring for her family, and in her faith. She padded off to the bedroom.

Moments later she came back. I worried, but quiet and small she gave me a hug and told me she loved me and to pray every day, then said good night.

I douse the lights, and sit, waiting in the dark. The nurse in me waiting for the soft sounds to still, and the son thankful to be home again.