There’s No Place Like Home

What makes a home a home? A city? Is it a physical structure? Is it the people that dwell in the structure? Or is it both? We have been in Boise, ID since August 5th, and so this has been by far the longest we’ve stayed in one spot.  The first week we were here we were in a bike shop and I saw a sticker in the shape of Idaho with the word “HOME” underneath.  I bought it knowing that this place would become like home to us.

We’ve been staying in the Boise Riverside RV park, and boy does that name deliver.  It is set alongside the Boise river bike path called “The Greenbelt.”  The Greenbelt stretches along the Boise river for 25 miles.  We’ve been biking almost everyday.  I (Nikki) have really fallen for biking along this path and will miss it terribly.  It could easily be my favorite part about the landscape here.  The river follows you as you bike next to and over it crossing many wooden bridges.  You can ride all the way to Boise State stadium and pass the zoo where you can wave to giraffes from your bike.  The trees and birds and water combine to make such a beautiful place to walk or ride.

It’s not just the Greenbelt that makes this place feel like home.  There’s the people here too.  My first cousin Cari, her husband Andrew and their son Landon live here.  They rescued us the first weekend we were here when our car died.  Mike’s cousin Caleb is here too training to be a lineman on electrical poles.  Mike’s Navy friend Paul and his family live an hour north and we spent the day with them last weekend in the rural woods followed by BBQ and deer watching on their back deck.  Our friends the Prices (who we lived next door to in Hawaii) live just around the bend from where we’ve been staying.  We’ve designated their backyard “Price Park” because 1) it has a pool 2) trampoline 3) swing set and 4) huge lawn.  We have cherished being their neighbors again this month. Lastly, my sister Laura, Adam and niece Lucy drove up to see us for the last few days.It is all these people who have made us feel at home here in Boise, along with the beautiful surroundings. We’ve created such memories that will stick with us when we think of this place.

As we begin to prepare for our next leg of the trip (North Idaho and Montana) we are leaving feeling bittersweet.  It’s hard to leave, but also time to go. That is how we felt at the beginning of this trip. It was a sacrifice to leave home.  It was hard.  But home has followed us.  We have this little tiny four sided RV.  There’s 4 of us nestled in here every night.  When we’re out for the day and it’s time to pack up we now say, “It’s time to go home.”  Home is the memories you make with the people you have, it whatever space you’re in.  It doesn’t matter how big or grandiose, whether stationary or on wheels.  By nature I am a homebody and this month I have begun to miss our home in San Diego.  But I wouldn’t trade our decision to go on this trip, not for a second.  A sacrifice, by definition is giving up something in order to gain something else in return.  What we’ve gained already in 6 weeks was worth all the hard work and sacrifice.

As we’ve moved from town to town there’s been many places we’ve loved and could see ourselves calling “Home” (don’t worry everyone in CA we’re not moving).  But we’re now more interested in the people in our home than the location and the structure.  We’ve really all been wandering since Genesis 3 when Adam and Eve were kicked out of the Garden of Eden.  So often we are striving to find a home on earth just like the garden, but there isn’t one.  Our home is in Heaven and this earth will always be lacking.  For now, we’ll keep on driving this mini home, loving on each other and sharing with you all the Lord is teaching us.

See you in Coeur d’Alene…

Much aloha,

LocoNani