That Kim Richey Song

I was talking to my Dad about Oregon today and it made me think about the idea of "home".  I think there is a grand difference between living somewhere and being home.  I think it is possible to live in a lot of places and not feel like you ever come home to them.  I also think it's possible to feel a connection to a place you have barely lived, or maybe even just stayed and feel like you are home.  I feel like that about Cazadero for example.  I have never "lived" in Cazadero, as far as living goes. I have never received my mail there or gone to school there.  I don't know any of the pressing political issues of Sonoma County, don't have a favorite Mexican restaurant there where they know I always would rather have the green sauce.  But Cazadero is more home to me than this house I am sitting in now in Jackson, CA.  Don't get me wrong, it is a nice house.  We love our house.....but this just isn't home.

Home gets even weirder for me when I go "home" to the bay area where I actually have had many homes.  There is the house on Rialto Dr. in Clayton.  Number 39.  That will always be my home, not just my house.  I remember every detail of that house, at least how it existed when I lived there.  I remember that the tile in the kitchen behind the stove had vegetables inlaid on it.  I remember the garden beds in the back yard and the circular brick planter that my Dad built.  I remember the apricot tree in the backyard and the bushes underneath the bedroom window where the Orb Spider lived one Summer.  I see occasional glimpses of this house sometimes and no matter how old I am or where I am sitting, my heart swells up like a balloon and I can hear my Dad calling for me to come in for dinner.  I can see my Mom laying on the deck in the Summer sun.  It's weird, too, that as far as everything surrounding that house, the areas of Clayton and Concord where I grew up?  I don't even recognize them.  The aren't home at all for me anymore.  But that house and that street, always mine.  Always home.

The there is Oregon.  I lived in Oregon for 13 months, 11 years ago.  I lived in two different houses there, each for about half the time I was there.  Not very long by any standard, yet it is the one place out of all the places I have ever lived where I actually felt like I had come home.  A lot of that had to do with the time in my life and the war I was returning from**, I know that.  But regardless of the circumstance and despite the relatively little time I lived there, my heart beats for the Oregon Coast as if I had lived there for generations, and no matter how long I stay away, I still remember everything. I think someday I will likely return there.  And I suspect it will be as it once was, a place called Home.

Kim Richey: "A Place Called Home"

http://youtu.be/s_ZCK7bDM4w


**On this, the day of my 11th birthday in remission from the pesky and stunning methamphetamine, with a shiny chip in my pocket that shows 18 months in remission from the devious and outrageous alcohol, I want to say something about getting into remission from the bigger thing, the biggest thing. The easily handed out, the subtly implied, the hardest part of all of it....the shame. The shame of addiction. On this day at this time, I am in remission from the shame. See, there is nothing morally wrong with any addict. There is simply unmanaged disease. I willingly accept the responsibility to manage my disease. BUT I reject ENTIRELY the societal burden of shame. I didn't get better. I was already good enough. I got well. There should be No shame in having sickness, illness, dis-ease. 

So, if you or someone you know is struggling with this or any illness, It's ok. You are ok. You need to get well and it is possible. Recover. Get found Kid. Find your way home Xoxo