I heard her voice whisper in sync with each step. "Ra, ma, da, sa, sa, say, so, hung..." I looked down to see my own bare feet stepping lightly along a grassy path. It was the path to the pond in my childhood, my feet small and vulnerable, my summer skin brown like tree bark. Blackberry bramble, teasel, and thistle abound but never under foot. The path was clear and the pond itself hummed, "Ra, ma, da, sa, sa, say, so, hung," with each step around the knoll of swaying elephant grass, then curving toward the kettle which held the most sacred space I've ever known. A necklace of cattails and nutweed, circled by a hidden choir of amphibians only to be heard from a distance. As my feet landed on the pond's edge the music stopped.

Some say home is where you're born, but I believe this was a place of healing for me to begin a new life, a new adventure toward healing not just my own heart, but generations of hearts before and after me. When I sit and meditate today, when I feel my breath and tune into my heart, I am healing my own past, and somehow, I am healing my mother's heart, and her mother's heart. My great-grandmother died by suicide, so I also hope that whatever life was like for her, this healing reaches her too, wherever she is. Is this magical thinking? Of course it is, and I hope it works. I hope it reaches my daughter's heart and her children and grandchildren too. This is a whole new way of being: healed and grateful, with a whole lot of space for adventure and joy.

Home is a place I've been searching for and found after decades of heartache and longing, after decades of meditation and dreaming, after moving and traveling, searching and scheming. With guidance from Great Blue Herons, the lullabies of crickets and spring peepers, and a blind devotion to Love, I can breathe again. It's been an adventure designed just for me, and now, I'm home. The tingling in my toes wakes me, and here I am, safe and sound, on Heron Hill.