Going Home

In about a week I am going back home to Peoria to celebrate with family and friends.

I wish I was celebrating coming back home or winning the lottery or finding junk furniture.

But we are celebrating Tracy's life.

Doesn't that sound awful that I would rather be celebrating anything but  Tracy's life?

It feels really selfish, but it's the truth.

Because the REASON we are celebrating

 is because he's no longer here.

Staring at a table of that reminder is good and very uncomfortable.

I think about him many times a day and insert something about him in conversations when I can and adore it when the grand boys are the ones to bring his name up even when it's a comment like-

you haven't watered grandpa and it looks like he is gonna die AGAIN,
referring to the plant we put some of his ashes under in the spring.  

Tracy would laugh his fool head off and be so proud

that his grands could find humor in that.

But that isn't the same as the ritual of the LAST goodbye.

(and no I don't for a second believe that it will be the last goodbye ever...case in point- leaving the next day to go to Indiana to say goodbye again, then there is the memorial bricks that have never been placed or even made and his equipment and and and)

I wish I had his blog printed off in book form for this event.  

He was so proud of how many people cared about what he wrote and how he wrote it.  

I am a bit disappointed in myself that I haven't kept up his wit and wisdom but really- 

who could compete with that?  

He did have a style all his own:)

I  love going through the photos and stories.

I am reminded of all the love 

that was bestowed on us through our journey.

I appreciate so much, every single day, all the kindness and generosity friends and strangers have given us.

While the rest of the world gets sucked into the ridiculousness of world politics or cyber gaming or fashion and fame, none of that means a thing to me.  

But you all do.

The horrors around the world DO matter to me and the answer to changing that always come back to the same thing. 

So simple- but not always easy.

Love.  

If these unfortunate people causing so much pain had been show the love and devotion Tracy and I were gloriously gifted then maybe they wouldn't feel the need to TAKE and FORCE and FEAR.

So getting together to show each other how much we LOVE/LOVED Tracy and show you all who and what HE really loved is more than just for us.  

It's an example of Tracy continuing to make the entire world a better place.

I'm sure he will be glad to finally be going Home.  

Home is where his heart is- with all of you.