Home is where one starts from.*

These are some things I always do when I go home to visit:

• eat Swedish pancakes for breakfast at the Stockholm Inn
• have long early morning conversations with my mother
• drive one or more of Grandma's secret ninja routes (she has elaborate backroad ways to avoid turning left at busy intersections)
• visit with my dear friend and cousin Rosie
• see a bad movie with my father
• cuddle the terror of the house for a few moments before the fangs come out
• go shopping in Grandma's basement
• wander through Poska's (a bohemian shop with an antique-y flair) for inspiration
• walk around the backyard and think of Bear, our late dog

If I included everything, the list would be too long and you would be bored and wondering why you still read my blog.

One of the reasons I like the Harry Potter books is because I can entertain the notion of apparating--do a graceful turn and show up 500 miles north in my parent's kitchen, much to the cat's consternation. Visits home are too brief.

*T.S. Eliot