By Lani Gering

I’ve been giving a lot of thought to what “home for the holidays” actually means. I went “home” to southeastern Wyoming last year for the Christmas holiday for the first time in almost 10 years. Granted, I have been home more times than that at different times over the years but, Christmas is a special time to be there.

A little background…Both of my parents are gone and I have one younger sister who lives 10 miles from our home town of about 300 people. While I chose to expand my horizons beyond the confines of Wyoming and pursue a career with the USDA and travel the USA, she chose to remain close to home and marry her high school sweetheart and live out her dream of farming. We are alpha/omega in many ways but also a lot alike in others – mannerisms, sense of humor, etc. In addition to she and her family, I am in touch with many longtime friends that I love to see while there and spending time with a cousin that means the world to me who lives in Colorado makes my trips home complete. Spending time with all of these people last year was amazing.

However, during the several years that I haven’t been able to go to Wyoming, “home” for the holidays has been where ever I end up. I have spent more than one Christmas alone and was fine with that but the majority have been with friends that are now like family to me now. Over the 30 years I have lived in Alexandria, I am lucky to have an amazing circle of people in my life and have been on a lot of Christmas adventures with them.

Since we live in a very transient place, I am sure that many of you know exactly what I am talking about. The old adage, “Home is Where the Heart is” truly has merit. As December unfolds, I wish you all the happiest of holidays and the merriest of Christmases. I also offer the following eclectic compilation of applicable quotes:

“Home wasn’t a set house, or a single town on a map. It was wherever the people who loved you were, whenever you were together. Not a place, but a moment, and then another, building on each other like bricks to create a solid shelter that you take with you for your entire life, wherever you may go.” ― Sarah Dessen, What Happened to Goodbye

“Christmas is a time when you get homesick— even when you’re home.” —Carol Nelson

“Christmas is a piece of one’s home that one carries in one’s heart.” —Freya Stark

“From home to home, and heart to heart, from one place to another. The warmth and joy of Christmas, brings us closer to each other.” —Emily Matthews

“The desire to go home that is a desire to be whole, to know where you are, to be the point of intersection of all the lines drawn through all the stars, to be the constellation-maker and the center of the world, that center called love. To awaken from sleep, to rest from awakening, to tame the animal, to let the soul go wild, to shelter in darkness and blaze with light, to cease to speak and be perfectly understood. ‘At Christmas, all roads lead home’.” —Marjorie Holmes

“Christmas is a piece of one’s home that one carries in one’s heart.” —Freya Stark

“From home to home, and heart to heart, from one place to another. The warmth and joy of Christmas, brings us closer to each other.” —Emily Matthews

“Perhaps home is not a place but simply an irrevocable condition.” ― James Baldwin, Giovanni’s Room.

“I wonder if it will be—can be—any more beautiful than this,” murmured Anne, looking around her with the loving, enraptured eyes of those to whom ‘home’ must always be the loveliest spot in the world, no matter what fairer lands may lie under alien stars.” ― L.M. Montgomery, Anne of the Island.

“At one time, most of my friends could hear the bell, but as years passed, it fell silent for all of them. Even Sarah found one Christmas that she could no longer hear its sweet sound. Though I’ve grown old, the bell still rings for me, as it does for all who truly believe.” —Chris Van Allsburg, The Polar Express

“May you never be too grown up to search the skies on Christmas Eve.” —Anonymous

“No matter how we may dread the rush, the long Christmas lists for gifts and cards to be bought and given—when Christmas Day comes there is still the same warm feeling we had as children, the same warmth that enfolds our hearts and our homes.” —Joan Winmill Brown

“There is no comfort anywhere for anyone who dreads to go home.” ― Laura Ingalls Wilder, Little Town on the Prairie