Dear Reader,
Every year I look forward to reading the Write a DearReader Contest entries, and this year didn't disappoint. The quality of writing was outstanding. Today's Honorable Mention piece was written by Susan Specht. Thanks Susan for sharing your story with us.
Home. Sounds so simple. Home is where the heart is. Home is where you lay your head at night. Love begins at home. So many lovely quotes and art work that can be hung on a wall. I have had many homes over the years. Home was with my parents, home was with my first husband, home was living as a single parent with my children, home is with my second husband and our grown children moving in and out. I truly did not understand that home wasn't a place, but a feeling until now.
I have grown up and lived in the same city in Ontario my entire life. I had always wanted to go to the East Coast but something always came up. Finally my second husband and I travelled out East for our honeymoon in 2008 and we have returned every year since. You see, my husband has an extremely large extended family in Nova Scotia who embraced me with open arms. They welcomed us into their homes and were there to provide anything we needed. Laughter, comradery, meals; they opened their hearts to us and us to them.
This year, we decided we should buy some property of our own in Nova Scotia. Buying property from thousands of kilometers away was a challenge in itself, but you guessed it, the cousins helped us. Various road trips were taken to scope out vacant land for us, pictures and videos were sent back and forth. We were finally successful on purchasing property and plans were made to go see it in person. We realized after reviewing the deed that the property was indeed owned by members of my husband's family generations ago.
One cousin heard we were coming and oiled the lock on the gate for us as he noticed it was rusty, another offered to clear all the brush with his tractor and brush hog, a third offered the use of his small trailer to help move debris around the lot. Another cousin sent a text shortly after we arrived saying simply, "Welcome home." Home in this case is a vacant lot on St. Mary's Bay with a fire pit and a whole lot of love from family who were thrilled for us. Home isn't a place, it's a feeling. Welcome home.
Susan Specht
Honorable Mention, 2020 Write a DearReader Contest
Thanks for reading with me. It's so good to read with friends.
Suzanne Beecher
Suzanne@DearReader.com
*Today's the last day to enter this week's special giveaway sponsored by Ink & Willow. Ten lucky book club winners will receive a copy of To Read or Not to Read: A Literary Journal for the Book Lover's Soul and those same ten winners will also each receive a second prize, randomly selected from the list of Ink & Willow's gift ideas and stocking stuffers, such as Choose Joy, an adult coloring book or 52 Weeks of Gratitude, a thankfulness journal. To enter, click here.
This month's Penguin Classics book is The Cancer Journals, by Audre Lorde, with a foreword by Tracy K. Smith. I have a copy to share with you, so start reading and enter today.
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