home: a holy place

My life sits on top of the battered ping pong table in our basement. The table is the dumping ground for college supplies; all of the things I need to set up a little life of my own, encased in recycled cardboard. It's a peaceful feeling to be able to see all of my belongings in one place, silently anticipating the move onto the next leg of my journey through this brutal, beautiful life. In one and a half weeks, I get to move *home.*

I've done a lot of 'independent study' on the concept of *home* over the last several years. What it means, how it feels, where mine is. For a while, I thought home was the place where my American Girl Dolls were. Home was tea parties and pansies and summer sawdust and pine needles. For a few years - see: middle school - when I was informed that cooties were fictitious and not *all* boys spent their time making fart jokes, I figured home could be a person. But now, on the precipice of my sophomore year at BU, I've decided that *home* is a happy collision of the two. Home is the physical place where your Best People are, and it feels so warm and so safe. In May, I finished my last final of freshman year and was set free into the world of summer, and yet I lingered. I didn't want to leave. Campus was blanketed in the lull that accompanies finals week, and most of my friends had already moved out for the summer. But still, I spent another hour or so just wandering the silent halls, wishing the year could continue. The memories I'd made, the struggles I'd overcome, and the bonds I'd formed at that place held me in a warm embrace that felt almost holy. It took a while to pull away.

Summer has been *good.* Rest, renewal, and continued self-discovery. But my small hometown feels in-between, and I'm ready to return to Bethel - in Hebrew, coincidentally, "a holy place." Busy, bustling, and full. Bethel is in-between too; sandwiched in the middle of childhood and adult life. But at least it's one step closer to the latter.

The lessons I learn at this place, in and outside of the classroom, continue to shape me into the woman I aspire to be for the rest of my life: ever Hannah, ever growing. The people at Bethel are my Best People, and they shape my future self, too. Bethel is my present, my future, and my forever family.

We're coming home.