Twenty four

"In Christ there are no goodbyes.  And in Christ there is no end."

After spending 5 days back home with my family I'm back in KC.  And it was as hard as ever coming back.  This time I broke down to my mom before I left.  *sigh*

For as short of a time as I spent at home, it was pretty significant.  We said goodbye in the form of a funeral.  My cousins' grandfather on the other side of their family passed away and we attended the rosary and funeral (it was like a reunion of my parents' old pals from when they ran around west Wichita back in the day).  I also said goodbye to my brother, seeing him probably for the last time before he leaves at the beginning of June for 1-2 years for South Korea and who knows where else.  So these past few days held a lot for me.  I had fun with my family down in Oklahoma hiking and going to our old spots and sharing memories of the state park where we vacation...saw The Avengers (I'll say this once and only once for the record:  it was a good movie)...had some separate one-on-one time with my parents...  It was good.  And really hard to leave again.  I could really live without the home-sickness.  For real.

In the past year I've discovered a "hole" in my heart that only home can fill.  I don't know how I didn't discover it my first couple of years of college, but this past year it has hit me hard.  If my "hole" in my heart for home is so huge and apparent and empty most of the time, it makes me wonder what my "hole" in my heart for God is like.  Is it as big?  It doesn't ache as much most of the time as my home "hole" does.  Do I ignore that ache?  Or do I fill it with other things that don't belong?  It could be that I've let that hole become cluttered, while the "hole" for home is still a new and fresh wound for me.

All I know is, I already have the number of days counted to the next time I go home. 24.