Home is where the heart is

Today was our last full day in Indianapolis. For the past nine days, lunches and dinners were shared with someone (and almost always with a different person), routines were ignored, and bedtime was when the last person leaves. For the past nine days, we have been surrounded by our dear families and friends. It's definitely an understatement to say I miss this place but I guess I didn't realize the intensity of how much I really missed it here until I drove by our old house.

The farthest window on the right was our bedroom. Of the almost two years we lived there,
my clearest memory of that room is sleeping alone because my husband was in basic training and MCT.
It could simply be because they were the latest memories. But it could also be because during those
"alone" months, I learned how strong and brave I can really be.

The two little windows was the bathroom.

The farthest window on the left was the guest bedroom. Dean and I slept in there for the four months before he left for
boot camp last year because it had a full size bed (instead of the king size bed in our room)
and it "forced" us every night to sleep closely to each other.

Directly underneath the guest bedroom was the kitchen. This place was the largest house I have moved in
since moving out of my mom's house but it had the smallest kitchen of them all.

The three little windows was the dining room. And the front door opened to the living room.
It also has a basement.

But the one that really tugs my heart are the flowers I planted. It is barely visible in this picture but it's that
blurry yellow spot right next to the front step. I planted these stargazer lilies exactly a month after our wedding
back in 2008.

This house is by no means the first house I had moved out of. Definitely not even close to the length of time compare to the house I lived in the longest. I don't even remember crying like this about my "childhood house." And so I couldn't understand why I was so emotional about this particular house. At least not until I spoke to my husband... He pointed that this house represents our life in Indianapolis. Our life before the Marine Corps. It represents me as a working registered nurse. It represents friends as opposed to acquaintances. This house represents the beginning of our marriage. And so even though Dean and I say our home is where we are, I can't help but think that a little part of me stayed in that house.

I know they say you can't go home again
I just had to come back one last time
Ma'am, I know you don't know me from Adam
But these handprints on the front steps are mine

Up those stairs in that little back bedroom
Is where I did my homework and I learned to play my guitar
And I bet you didn't know under that live oak
My favorite dog is buried in the yard

I thought if I could touch this place or feel it
This brokenness inside me might start healing
Out here it's like I'm someone else
I thought maybe I could find myself

If I could just come in, I swear I'll leave
Won't take nothing but a memory
From the house that built me