Ah. I'm glad I didn't read the others, 'til I got mine posted, or I wouldn't have done it. Aimee, you should be in here, all the time.

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I hear other people use the word, and I wonder if I'll grow into it. Looking around, I think "This is nice."

It'll do, for a while.

The itch will come. It always does. I don't know if it's a push or a pull, but it's insistent. I can fool it sometimes, running thousands of miles, but I know it really wants me to cross a border, an ocean, a cultural chasm.

While other people can know, and nest, I can only guess.

Maybe someday I'll tire of gnawing off my leg to escape.

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Cindy, I like yours. That picture's info says it was dated 1973--but it sure looks 1940s to me, and I first thought of WWII, and home fires burning, etc. But my second glimpse of the wall took me right home to the Blue Ridge. Those walls, and many of the public buildings, were built by the CCC. There are several underpasses that look just like the arch Gandalfe rides through on his way to Isengard in Fellowship, built at the same time. It's such a grounding feeling of where my life has been lived to see that stonework in a photograph of a stranger.

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Cindy, I like yours. That picture's info says it was dated 1973--but it sure looks 1940s to me, and I first thought of WWII, and home fires burning, etc.

I decided to pretend the "73" wasn't a date, but some other kind of number, because the hair was so 40s (even though the clothes are I don't know what).

But my second glimpse of the wall took me right home to the Blue Ridge. Those walls, and many of the public buildings, were built by the CCC. There are several underpasses that look just like the arch Gandalfe rides through on his way to Isengard in Fellowship, built at the same time. It's such a grounding feeling of where my life has been lived to see that stonework in a photograph of a stranger.

That's beautiful, Beverly. You almost have a drabble, right there.

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Removed...a little too raw.

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Oh, Kristin.

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Ouch, Kristin. That's very painful.

One of the things that's going on with me and these photographs is that I have a family picture that matches each one closely. On the shelf to my left is a b/w shot of me sitting on what could be the same wall as the woman in #1, with a similar-to-the-point-of-same view in the background. The b/w of Mom and me at The Hermitage for #2, one of DH on the beach at Cape Lookout, swatting at mosquitos the size of paper wasps for #3. I don't have one for #4, but #5 is Mom and Dad's 50th anniversary party, and #6 is my dad, when he still had hair, in his suit and some nameless friend's borrowed car. From that same day, I have him and Mom, in her flower-print dress and cartwheel hat. They'd been married for a year or two, but they had a city-hall wedding and no photographs, so I've always thought of that picture as their "wedding" picture.

I can't be objective on this batch of photos.

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7:40 in the morning and I am counting down to the end of the day. I get into the office and count down the hours until my first break. Then I count down to lunch. Then I count down to my second break. The final count down to 5:00. Only 3 blocks til the train station. Only 5 minutes until the train comes. 20 minute ride. Half-mile walk to the car. One and a half mile drive. Walk up the drive, open the back door and there she is. Excited and smiling, she reaches for me. And I am home.

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Photo six, word count: 100

Momma's prominent scowl took on new depth, the day she received that letter. About six months before, my Aunt Mae had caught herself a rich husband in New York, and I figured it must be a picture of their new baby. Since her sister's soft life had been making momma bitter for as long as I could recollect, I shrugged off her scowl, squealing as I grabbed the photo from her hand. "Is it baby Kathryn? I wanna see her!"

His familiar face in that unfamiliar setting brought me up right sharp. "Daddy's not coming home again, is he, momma?"

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Such lovely drabbles. Cindy, that last one was a kicker! ita, I like yours in particular because that urge was (and still is, to some extent) a driving force in my life for so many years. I'm at the point right now of wanting to gnaw my leg off. Only the chains have gotten heavier in the past few years and I'd have to gnaw off so much I'd bleed to death.

Personally, I have much to say about home. Only, I'm barely moving on four hours sleep and my brain is in lockdown right now. I think a short nap is in order before I try to come up with anything to match the pictures, or not, as the case may be. It may even have to wait until tomorrow. But I really, really like the topic this week.

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