This is the most beautiful place on Earth. There are many such places. Every man, every woman, carries in heart and mind the image of the ideal place, the right place, the one true home, known or unknown, actual or visionary….
~ Edward Abbey
(Desert Solitaire)
My ideal place is an actual place I’ve been to (and fell in love with) in the Highlands of Scotland. When the need arises, I shut my eyes and can be there in moments.
Ah, Laurie, that’s how I feel about Cape Cod. My son fell in love with Scotland when he went there, too. I have a feeling the same thing will happen to me when I get to Norway.
Barbara — You can count on it! 🙂
I wonder where your one true home is, Barbara. It can hold so many meanings to different people. They say that home is where the heart is, and I agree. My home is where I am, where my family lives, either with me or nearby, yet there is another yearning for the place where I grew up, where the four seasons exist, and the mountains and valleys take my breath away.
You made me think of my favorite Dave Matthews song, the one that always lifts my spirits. One of the lines in “The Best of What’s Around” goes “Turns out not *where* but *who* you’re with that really matters…” My children are all living far away now so I’m no longer emotionally tied to where we are living now. I suspect my one true home is somewhere in Norway, but for now it is definitely on Cape Cod, where Tim & I both spent our childhood summers with our grandparents, and where we took our own children almost every summer, too.
When I look at images of rural England I sometimes feel it tugging at me …
I have felt that tugging, too, when I see pictures of Norway, and strange as it may sound, I had a moment of transcendence when I walked into a replica of a stave church at the Norway pavilion at EPCOT… Do you wish to take a trip to England some day?
I, too, think my one true home is with family, mostly my daughter and grandson. I especially love California…Sausalito, Eureka, San Diego. Everything seems newer there and I would hope to get there again soon.