Not a single eggshell in sight

When home doesn't feel like home.

All I can think about today is having my own home again.

While I am grateful for my parents and their beautiful home and yard, which have given Art and me a safe place to land and rest, this is no longer my home—yes, temporarily it is, but not really. It’s not “mine.”

Interestingly, the home before this one didn’t feel like mine either. Maybe it did at first—it was the most excited for a home I had ever been. We paid the bills and painted the walls. Everything in it was something I loved. But a house doesn’t make a home. Looking back I realize, it has been quite some time since I have truly felt at home.

Fall is my favorite time of year. It feels special. Each day feels just a bit more magical than the seasons before or what comes after.

I love the crispness: the cool breeze and the chilly mornings. I love making chili on a Sunday. I love a good rich candle burning throughout the day. I love cozy blankets and dim lighting.

Fall here is beautiful—the leaves a blend of bright orange, red, and yellow. But there is a nagging within my heart. With each passing day, I grow more and more awakened to the fact that I am longing for my own space—my own living room with my own furniture where Art and I can dance and play. Where there is a lightness I haven’t felt in nearly 4 years.

For a while, I needed the comfort of being surrounded by others. I needed the check-ins and the forced social interaction. I needed a clean space that I didn’t have to worry about cleaning myself—because most days that felt impossible.

I know that at the time I decided to move home, it was the right decision and really, the only decision.

Sometimes we have to make decisions based on what we need, not on what we want. I can say now, I am proud I was able to do that. It’s a humbling process.

It is what I needed. It gave Art and I a fighting chance at being okay—because let’s be real, if I’m not okay, it’s not likely he will be okay and that was truly my biggest concern. I have lived life not okay. I would have survived. But I was so scared for my baby boy to only know a mother who was barely hanging on. I knew that wasn’t fair to him.

So we moved. Back home to my small little town, back into my childhood home that holds beautiful memories, generational cycles, and lots of warmth, beauty but some pain too.

As I’m grieving the loss of a marriage, a city I loved and had made my own, and grieving the person I was and the life I had planned, I’ve found I am grieving the loss of my independence the most. The loss of the Marah that I knew. The Marah that had a home within the literal 4 walls of her own house but also, a home within herself.

I miss the coziness of MY home when I wake up in the morning and make coffee in the kitchen with all of my things. A kitchen where drawers are organized the way I like and where I know exactly where everything is. I make my coffee and maybe some sourdough toast—with butter and jam—and then head to the dining room table to eat my breakfast and journal while Art dances to worship music.

We head out on a walk in a neighborhood we love and we meet up with friends for a playdate later because we all live in the same city again.

Sometimes I feel the rage boil up inside of me that this is not what I wanted. Because of someone else’s choices, we are here and will be for a bit longer. It would be easy if I just let myself be angry every day. If I blamed everything I didn’t like about my current situation on someone else, but deflection doesn’t allow for growth. Whether or not someone played a part in our current situation, we still have to take responsibility for the steps we take to change what we don’t like.

I refuse to play victim to my own life.

I know this isn’t forever. Art and I will have our own home again one day. It will feel so special and magical because of all we have been through to get there. It will be a home where I pay the bills myself through hard work and making things happen and God’s constant faithfulness and provision. I will decorate it in a way that feels peaceful and interesting and feels like me.

I will be able to be thankful for the time we were given here in Kentucky and the ways it was so incredible and the ways it was so hard.

It’s easy to feel great when life is good—our environment is just as we want it to be and things are just flowing. It’s not so easy to feel good or be our best selves when nearly everything feels like there is pushback or tension.

So with that, I will continue to remind myself that I am doing a great job. I will find compassion for myself and my mothering and my capacity and remind myself daily that I made the choices I did so we can have the future we deserve.

A home full of peace and love and joy with not a single eggshell in sight.

I love you.

Thanks for reading.