Overload

I suppose if I were mentally stronger, I would write my way out of being overloaded.

I haven't done that. Instead, I've relished being overloaded, relished the intensity and deep satisfaction I've experienced since I last posted on this blog on November 17th. I've been overwhelmed by beauty, great companionship, and spiritual invigoration.

Two weeks ago on November 19th I stepped out of the Spokane International Airport and into the fold of my family. It dizzied me. Temporarily free of my responsibilities in Eugene, I entered the euphoria of laughs, stories, warmth, food, acceptance, wise-cracking, loyalty, faithfulness, and relaxation my family so generously gives me and each other.

The older I grow, the more deeply secure I feel with my sisters and mother. I long for their company, long for the history and familiarity and caring I experience when we are together. Home and family shelters me from the demands and tensions in other parts of my life. InlandEmpireGirl has devoted herself to creating a home alive with gardens, dogs, cats, wood-burning warmth, and comforting food. It's a sanctuary. I hadn't been with my family on Thanksgiving Day for about eighteen years and the slightly crowded and laughter/story-telling/wise-cracking noisiness of being together deeply satisfied me, roused my ecstasy.

Thanksgiving ended and on Friday PKR and Silver Valley Girl drove me to Chewelah to meet Ed so I could begin my annual Thanksgiving weekend get together with my life-long friends from Kellogg. I left one family and entered into my second family and adjoining rooms at the Ameritel Inn became my second santuary, my other home.

It's so simple. Poker. Basketball and football games on television. Chips, peanuts, pop, beer, whiskey, salami, cracked wheat bread, cheese, wisecracks. Stories. The casino. Bowling. Joni and Carol joining in. Comfortable, easy, relaxing friendship, free of self-consciousness, just being Kellogg boys and relishing time away from jobs and family and work responsibilities. I long for this time with my friends. I can be most like the person I've been all my life, not the person I started to be when I began my academic life, not the person I started to be when I started to live in Eugene, Oregon, not the person I started to be when I left Idaho and Inland Empire. I get to be the most fully a guy from Kellogg I ever can be and it satisfies me deeply.

I think I'll end it there.

Travelling home for Thanksgiving and travelling home to spend a couple of full days with my life-long friends overwhelmed me, overloaded me with a bliss I cannot and do not experience any where else.