Coming home. It’s a quick turn off the big highway, a short drive down the lane, and a turn into the drive with a gate that opens quietly, offering me passage. I pass through it, up the drive, beneath the Spanish moss, and turn into the carport, where I stop. I’m home. The cats watch my progress, hungry if they’ve not been fed, curious if otherwise. The gate closes behind me, a whale’s mouth closing on its krill, barely aware of what just happened.

When my wife was still alive, my parking spot was to the right beside her car. She’s gone. I have her spot. Mine is given over to the zero-turn mower and the various dirt bikes my son has collected. Sometimes they’re in the workroom, which is a fine spot to do mechanical tinkering, and even a bit of painting when my son is so inclined. I have neither the skill nor the patience and it’s been a long time since I attempted a wood working project, partly because I mostly built bookshelves and now I have plenty.

I’ve noticed lately that the house, although the same size it’s always been, seems to fit me comfortably these days, as if a second person was never even here. There’s a warm embrace to the place as I enter, and it closes in around me. There’s my chair where I can sit and stare out the window, or with my new eye, once again read a book. Sometimes, I sit there. Sometimes I go stand on the porch, as I did yesterday when it rained, and watch the pasture or look at the plants. Choices. They all seem good because I’m home. And sometimes I wonder why I ever leave, although I know, that leaving is how you get to come home to feel its healing embrace. The in and out of life.

John W. Wilson is the author of The Long Goodbye: A Caregiver's Tale