Finally Home

Over the past few weeks, I have been thinking about the word, "home" and what it really means to me. If you look it up in the dictionary, it defines the word in a few different ways; a place of origin, a place of residence, a familiar or usual setting, or my favorite, the social unit formed by a family living together. Now I agree that the dictionary definition of it somehow seems so unemotional and dry, but the meaning behind it helps me realize what is happening to my newly formed family.

I have moved around, I wouldn't say a lot, but enough to have never really had a city that I referred to as my home. Every two to three years was the average, but I learned to accept new places and new routines over time. What I didn't pay much attention to was that the cities that I lived in didn't just provide people with homes to live in, but instead they provided a location, or a starting point where their families began and continued to live within.

I have had family with me in almost every city that I have lived in and I have always enjoyed their company, but like most young children and teens you tend to take that group for granted. I especially can say that I didn't know what I had because I lost part of mine unexpectedly and never knew how it would affect me. Now, I'm not trying to create a sob story, because what happened was not all for the worse. I soon learned a few things about my family: My brothers were not my enemies but friends forever; my mother was a stronger woman than I ever gave her credit for; and having "lost" a father, I now can appreciate the importance of having one, or even more, knowing the importance of my role in my child's life.

Now that last part, I think, was the greatest influence on me since the day my father left. Even though I am now able to see my father whenever I want, and we have been able to learn about each other and forgive the past, I still tend to long for how my life would have been with my father there for those tough years. But in the same thought, I have to acknowledge that I may not have learned my place now without that experience.

Again, I know that most of you have heard, a least a portion, of my families past and that isn't really what this post is about. It's more just a background to help me explain a little of what's going on inside my head these days. I'm sure that these thoughts are not original, because I'm not the first father to walk this earth, so I know that the other fathers out there understand the levity of having a baby.

Every day is a new challenge, and I can't say that it's all peachy, but when I take a moment to step back and realize that there is a new life that Kari and I created and she is, unknowingly, depending on us to take care of her and love her, and even though that job seems daunting, I take it with pride.

Now there is a peace inside of me that no matter where my family lives, what type of house we have, no matter what job may come or obstacles we will face, I can say that I will always have my family, even better, a permanent home, and now it is our own.

-Jonathan