Finding Home...

There has been a lot of self-confrontation happening in my neck of the woods... is this the elusive "growing up" I hear so much about?

I went home for 1 week and a half to a wonderful house, an incredible family, and a huge TV... what more could a man want?...

How about some familiarity... not easy to see just how far you can stray from your circle of friends in such a short time... how quickly and dramatically your priorities can change, despite an assured sense that in reality, you yourself have changed very little, that you were always in the same frame of mind... though not particularly sad, it hardly serves as a cause for celebration... places where I felt "normal", for severe want of a better word, no longer feel as such... they may be comfortable, but there is an underlying sense that this is distinctly different from before... maybe I am different from before... either way it doesn't quite fit...

Ok so it is a little sad to think that I don't fit in my old skin anymore... despite the excitement of new starts and fresh beginnings, seeing my old hometown and experiencing what I did there has instilled a nagging, recurring thought; is anything for certain? Can friendships and relationships and connections last? From Australia to the Pacific islands to Europe to the US, I have had some incredibly tight group of friends and Brothers... yet they all faded, whether through distance, time or a combination of both...

So I think now to my group here, those Brothers with whom I have influenced and inspired a new generation of ballers, those Brothers with whom I have given up my time and money and energy without fanfare or fuss or recognition simply for the sake of doing something good... those Brothers with whom I have acted a fool and laughed until my stomach hurt... those Brothers who have been there through a tragedy and shared in the successes... aren't they too to disappear?

Aren't I to disappear?

Anna was a volunteer for Habitat for the last 2 weeks. As I was accomopanying her to the airport last night she made a great comment; if you think about the good things of a place, and you remember the people first rather than the physical place itself, that's a wonderful thing...

I wholeheartedly agree; I feel privileged to have had the friendships and brotherhoods I have had...

Yet there remains, inaudibly, under the surface, the concern that maybe nothing lasts...

I have been following Seiji's blog for some time now; apart from being a baller on the court, kid is an academic baller as well, the kind you overtly want to guard but secretly hope you never have to...

He has been killing me softly with his song about this girl... (there's always a girl...)

So back to the bridge; doesn't it always disappear?

So here's the full question in my head at the moment: if home is where the heart is, then where's my home?

My Brothers, disappear... My family, far flung... My Girl...

Anyone? If the heart is spread out, where is home?...

Before you send me a worried email, Mom, please know I'm not upset or depressed... just wondering how to make sense of it all...

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