Katie’s Been Gone

excerpted from the great Bob Dylan

Dear Katie, don't ya miss your home?
I don't see why you had to roam.

Dear Katie, since you've been away,
I lose a little something every day.
I need you here, but you're still out there.
Dear Katie, please drop me a line,
just write, Love, to tell me you're fine.

Oh, Katie, if you can hear me,
I just can't wait to have you near me.
I can only think,
Where are you,
What ya do, maybe there's someone new.

I have been away from Boise for three weeks; first to Montana for two weeks, then to Raleigh, then to Atlanta, and now back in Boise.

There is no one new and I do long to be home, although these days I’m no longer sure how to define my version of home. Generations of writers and thinkers have stewed upon this question but the answer resonates differently for everyone. For me, for now, I feel unsettled. Is home in Boise in my brick house that is filled with my things? Or is home in Montana, with my husband and my puppies in the pop-up trailer on the ranch? Is home a place, is it a person, or a feeling? My guess is that for me the conglomerate of these things is my home and that I will always feel unsettled without all of them, all together, all at once.