Sabbatical Journal: 18. The End

Saturday 25 July. 12:50 a.m.

The knot in my stomach awoke me this morning. Tired still. Cathy says butterflies. It's a combination of things, one of which is we're not coming back, the other is we're running out of money; then, today, the Humana check for insurance came in. The Lord does provide for us! Yet this morning, try as I might, I found it difficult to be thankful for a day in which my parents left and we prepared to leave. Still… I surrender!

It's much harder to leave a place you probably won't come back to (Saffron Walden) than leaving a place (Las Vegas) for a year. Robert was hit hard about leaving his friends.

So tired!

Some of the Things We'll Miss

Monday 27 July. 1:25 p.m. Westfield House. Big white clouds against blue background, heavy breeze with wind.

Robert and I are here today, our last day at the house. Like the Del Mar in 1964, when my mother and I went back to clean the vacation house. What a great day! I remember that day at the beach. How will Robert recall?

I have strong feelings at leaving, it seems things are undone. But not really. The normal fear of flying and a steak dinner kept me tossing and turning last night. I keep wondering, I suppose, if we will be back. Perhaps not. Of course, it's possible we may. I realized today: we have no real home in a place. If home is where we are all gathered, then we have learned that we need not have a place attachment. I suspect the same thing was true when we were children, but why then the place attachment?

I'm having a Guinness draft in the can, waiting for the floor to dry and Robert to return from the town, where he is doing some last minute shopping. Then we are back to London. It will be fun to be back in the USA, the land of cheap gas and things!

Today is the anniversary of our arrival here. It was better then, and how happy we were to finally have arrived at our new home. I remember that good feeling more than I remember how we were running out of money at the time. Just as we are now!

I fear for our plants, our hanging baskets.

We really felt at home here. We moved in and we made it our own for the year. Now it is easy to remember sunny days, but how many were cold! Sitting at my desk trying to be Jack London or Graham Greene, and freezing till I finally buckled in and bought a fan heater. Now all I have are the rather sterile photos, all of the souvenirs, etc., none as good as the memories, but a means to gain access to those memories. I made a note to myself, a few days ago to that effect: "When do we stop collecting souvenirs? When the possibilities end."