Being in England - Coming Home

Hello from southern England...

I am staying with my cousin, Liz, and her husband, Jason, in a small town called Box about 6 miles east of Bath. They live with her younger brother, Churton, just up the hill from her younger sister, Georgie and her family. We arrived on Tuesday evening and have been able to just have time together, drinking tea, visiting Bath, going into Bristol today to see the house where my mother grew up and to take a lovely walk in Ashton Court, a wild park and golf course over the Suspension Bridge overlooking the city. I have also been able to spend time with my aunt, Shirley, a wonderful woman who is married to my mother's brother. I then got to spend time with George, my uncle and my godfather, who is full of stories and opinions that reveal a much richer side to my family and its history than you will hear anywhere else!

I love being with family and feeling my familial connection to these people. I cannot believe how long it has been since I have seen them and yet, despite how little time we have actually spent together, how many shared memories we have of our times together. Growing up in America meant that I never really knew my cousins except for our infrequent visits back here. We didn't grow up taking family holidays or just getting to be together, and I know that this has created a commitment on my brother's (Nick), sister's (Tori) and my part to make sure that our children, as first cousins, actually know each other and spend a lot of time together. Being here, I realize how much I have missed having extended family - from both my father's and my mother's sides - in my life.

The last time I was in England was 27 years ago...when I was picking up our rental car at the airport the other night, I was thinking about the last time that I was at Heathrow. I was flying back to the US after living and traveling over here for a year. If someone had told me that I would not return to England for 27 years, I certainly would not have believed them, and, if I had believed them, I really believe that I would not have left.

The longer I was not here, the more I "forgot" my connection to this country, its land and its people and to myself. I simply became American again when I returned to the States...but what I have been so deeply reminded in being here...no - it is more a feeling of having been RE-AWAKENED to is - that I am English through and through. I may sound American, I may have American habits and attitudes, but that is just the crust - the more external aspects of who I am.

The real me is English... the soft inner dough ( I am trying to find a way to stay with the bread metaphor here! Not sure if it is really working!!) is as British as my cousins are, as the soil is here, as the rain and the lushness, as the accents are! It has been quite the unexpected experience of this journey...

I knew that this time of being with family and friends after the pilgrimages was going to be a time of integration and reorganizing myself, but quite honestly, I did not expect this. This is the non-rational, unpredictable experience...perhaps this is the alchemy of all of what I have experience and been preparing for the first 3 weeks of my travels - that this was a journey to come home, and for me, coming home is being in England and fully acknowledging and honoring the English in me.

I feel as though I have come home...and I felt it from the first moment I stepped foot on English soil. I told myself to be patient, that I had not even interacted with the people yet, and so many people have told me how much it has changed over here. I have now been here a week, and feel this sense of being "home" even more strongly and clearly than when I first arrived.

We are all going out to dinner to a local pub, The King's Arms, in Monkton Farleigh, a tiny village 3 miles from here that overlooks Bath. So must go and freshen up...