Thinking about home

Another disturbed night, concluding with late rising, and missing the walk to the bridge to watch the Egrets depart. Late morning, Churchwarden Pam and  her husband Alwyn called in and took me out for a coffee and chat. Then it was time to cook and eat before finishing and printing off my final sermon for tomorrow, then writing the end-of-stay report requested by the diocese. I was mildly annoyed that it was dark by the time I finished, and had not yet been out for a walk. I settled for walking as far as the bridge and back. 

It was pitch dark over the charco water No moon was visible. It had been cloudy all day, quite a rarity here. The overspill from street lighting illuminated only a small area below the bridge. The Coots were still out and about and I had a few glimpses of warblers dashing out of the reeds momentarily on their strange erratic flight patterns. Are their eyes keen enough to hunt insects in semi-darkness? There were bats there too, with distinctive flight patterns and movements of their own. Quite intriguing was the unidentifiable small bird which moved from one bank to another at high speed in a horizontal straight line, strangely purposeful compared with the others. Many of the inhabitants roost in the shelter of cane and reeds during the hours of darkness, but not all it seems. There's so much I don't know.

After supper, I listened to an interesting programme on BBC Radio Four with international writers reflecting on the many meanings of the concept of 'home' in their own experience and in the works of other people. It certainly stimulated me to think about what 'home' means to me. I've ministered in ten different settings and with Clare made a home in fifteen different places during my working life. Learning to be at home and flourish wherever we found ourselves had been characteristic of our life together. For seven years in retirement Meadow Street has been home to us us, but locum duties have taken me temporarily to seven new places, where I've had to make myself at home for one to three months. All this, since leaving my birthplace and living in three other places in my student years. 

Home is wherever Clare is, to return to, rather than any remembered or ideal place. When I think about it, I struggle to identify any one environment where I could envisage spending the rest of my days. If anyone asks me where 'home' is, I say 'Wales', or 'Cardiff' but nothing more specific than that. I trained and was ordained in Cardiff, and a journey lasting fifty years started there. If I don't ever feel entirely settled in Cardiff, it's because we set out from from there, not imagining it would be a return journey. It became a default place to return to, however. Neither of us have any current family memories or associations in the city, nor in Wales for that matter, except for family funerals at Thornhill Crem, mostly decades ago. We love Wales, but rarely think of moving elsewhere in the Principality to settle. As Clare says, I've been restless all our married life. I'm not sure I know the reason why. Will I ever really settle anywhere?