“Where we love is home; home that our feet may leave, but not our hearts.”
– Oliver Wendell Holmes
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Throughout my life I have had a variety of selfish reasons to come home, and they were mainly driven by either self-preservation or pure self-interest.
When I was a kid, around 8 or 9 years old, I can recall leaving home to go play at the local park, explore the fields around our neighborhood, and hang out with friends nearby, inevitably getting caught up in a riveting game of cops and robbers or hide and seek. As the day waned to a close and the sun had shrunk into the mountains, I would have to head for home or risk severe consequences. See, in my family children were better seen and not heard, or even better, rarely seen at all, but when that time of day rolled around we had better be back home—or else.
As time went on and I hit the teenage years, little changed. I still came home by a certain time to preserve my hide, but that time grew later with increasing freedoms and an unceasing pestering of my parents for a later curfew. I came home less and less often, and pretty soon, I was couch-surfing, staying with one friend after another, and for a while, it almost felt like I didn’t even have a home.
It was truly liberating, and this period of my life was one in which I truly felt free.
After high school, as I entered the workforce, I bounced from one blue collar job to another (I didn’t start college until ten years after finishing high school, but that’s another story for another blog on another day). While each job had its benefits, from being a pool boy (none of the stories about pool boys are true, by the way—it’s a terribly boring job), to learning the trade of jewelry, to detailing cars, and finally, to manufacturing materials for use in electronics, they all had one similarity: I lived to come home.
Like the Loverboy song, I was workin’ for the weekend, and whenever my shift was up, I could not wait to hit the road and head home, because once there I could relax with a beer, play a few video games, work on my classic car, or engage in whatever hobby of the month was currently wasting my time. Even though I already had two children, I still came home for primarily selfish reasons. Even after I started college, that didn’t change for the most part, because my attitude kept reminding me that coming home was pointless. I left school and work, only to come home to homework and housework. My self-pity at this point was legendary, and I wallowed in it like a champ.
As my studies turned to mindfulness and presence, however, my awareness began growing into something different. I began looking at the daily task of heading home with a new and refreshed perspective, and soon, all of it changed in an instant.
One day not that long ago, as I was making the long drive from campus back to my house, with my youngest son along for the ride (I believe he was four at the time), the following song came on the ol’ iPod, a song I had just downloaded the day before. Before you read on, I strongly encourage you to take three and a half minutes out of your day to listen deeply, paying close attention to the lyrics.
However, if you are a victim of one of the ills of our society, possessing an ever-decreasing attention span, and you didn’t want to listen to the song in all its depth, grace, beauty, and power, here are the lyrics:
“You’re The Reason I Come Home”
Watching you watching me
A fine way to fall asleep
The neighbors fight as we both rest our eyes
Hands in the fallen snow
Numb to the winter cold but we don’t mind ’cause we’ll get warm inside
You’re the reason I come home
You’re the reason I come home my love
You’re the reason that when everything I know falls apart
You’re the reason I come home
Paper doll silhouettes
Fingertips on window glass
The street’s asleep so I breathe you in deep
The tragedies of chemistry
People dream of what you and me have found effortlessly
You’re the reason I come home
You’re the reason I come home my love
You’re the reason that when everything I know falls apart
You’re the reason I come home
And for a long time I remember saying prayers for something perfect
Saying prayers for someone kind
It’s in my head
We’re spinning circles down the avenues instead
You’re the reason I come home
You’re the reason I come home my love
You’re the reason that when everything I know falls apart
You’re the reason I come home.
What relevance does this have, other than being a really great message, as well as a really great song? Here’s the kicker, the twist in the story.
My son (remember, he was only four at the time) asked me from the back seat, “Daddy, what does it mean when everything falls apart?”
After coming to terms with the fact that my preschooler just heard, recognized, and almost comprehended the lyrics to a song as we drove down the freeway, I thought for a moment on how to make it relevant to him and put it in terms he could really identify. I answered, “You know when you have a really bad day, like when your sister bugs you and won’t leave you alone, you keep getting in trouble for things you didn’t mean to do, and on top of it all, you just don’t feel very good?”
“Yeah, daddy…”
“That’s it. When you are having a really bad day, that’s when everything falls apart.”
Silence. The song kept playing and I kept driving. My mind started wandering off to something else for just a second before it was snapped back to the present moment by a statement that utterly rocked my world and continues to do so to this day.
“Daddy…” my little one said matter-of-factly, as I prepared to respond to yet another of the never-ending barrage of questions that four year-olds serve up on a daily basis.
“Yes, baby bear?”
“You’re the reason I come home.”
I had to pull the car over at that point, because tears of joy and pride and unbridled, relentless love started falling uncontrollably, one right after the next, and I was rendered incapable of operating a motor vehicle. My son, confused at why I was so moved, as well as why we weren’t moving, looked curiously at his blubbering father.
“What’s wrong, Daddy?”
“Nothing, baby bear, nothing at all,” I replied. “In fact, everything about what you just said to me is what is right with the world. Thank you.”
To this day, we listen to the song together, smile at one another, and remind each other that we are the reason the other comes home. The tradition has also spread to the other members of the family, and my outlook on what it means to come home has been changed forever.
My family is the reason I come home. Don’t forget that the people you truly work for are waiting for you at home, so the next time you walk in after a long day, treat them as such.
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This post first appeared on Mindful Dad.
Image: Flickr/