Roots & Wings

♪♪ "When I think of home/I think of a place/where there's love overflowing..." ♪♪

If that's the definition of home, if home truly is where the heart is, then I've never been more at home in my life than I am right now.  We have so much love in this house, love in excess, love exploding out the windows and spilling out into the driveway.  One time in an interview, Julia Roberts said, of her three children with husband Danny Moder, "How lucky we are that we love each other so much that we burst into three pieces."  That's exactly how I feel about our little family. 

Doug loves crazy, rain-soaked Washington, and largely in part to our incredible Washington family and friends, I do too.  But is it okay to look back sometimes?  Is it okay to occasionally miss Kansas so much it actually makes me ache?  The nostalgia is so strong, it's tangible.  Sometimes if the weather's just right, a whiff of bonfire in the air, I can close my eyes and instantly be transported back there, just for a minute.

I miss everything about home.  Crisp September evenings aren't quite the same without a Spartan football game to cheer for; I loved the sound of a roaring, enthusiastic crowd in the stands.  I miss the smell of burning pastures.  I miss being able to get anywhere I needed to go in five minutes.  I miss the anticipation of having four distinct and dramatic seasons (I won't dwell on this one, suffice to say this Washington weather is hard on me).  I miss baseball season, I spent 19 years cheering on my dad's team... I miss the van rides home from road games we won (but I do not miss the van rides home from the ones we lost :).  I miss raging thunderstorms and nights in the basement huddled up listening to tornado sirens.  I miss the people.  Lord, do I ever miss the people, I loved our tight-knit little community.  I miss my Kansas family and my grandma's German blackberry kolaches.  I miss the simplicity and slow pace of life in a small town.  I miss the abundance of wide open spaces, the Flint Hills at night, and long drives on dusty gravel roads.

I guess if I'm really being honest, I miss my childhood.  I probably view my memories through rose-colored glasses but that's okay, I like the idea that you can hold on to the good things and let the bad fall away.  Life wisdom from Sweet Home Alabama: "You can have roots and wings."

I just can't help myself, I have to include another kolache recipe, this time from Homesick Texan.  (How fitting!  After further examination, I'll be doing a lot more cooking from that blog.)