Finding Your Place in Things: A Letter to Our Twin Boys

As submitted to NPR's "This I Believe"

During a good ‘ole Nor-Easter that silenced the landscape, you were born, Austin and Carson, forever altering your father’s and my lives. Like the leaves of a maple tree transform from green to red in fall, identity, lifestyle, love and challenge all changed a shade. I believe my journey into motherhood has been eased by the enduring anchor of place. Spending time in landscapes that have meaning has led to finding a home, as well as a sense of self. Familiar soil and sky have a way of charting an exploration into one’s soul.

Moving a dozen times before I was 25, I spent my childhood and youth embracing new landscapes and cultures. As a child in Heidelberg, Germany, I found wonder in the language of other children at the playground. As a teen in Jackson, Mississippi, I listened to Eudora Welty read of southern hospitality and injustice. As a young adult, I rode my bike past miles and miles of Indiana corn. But despite learning from each place and way of life, I sensed a disorienting rootlessness. I could not call any of those landscapes my home.

For over a decade, your dad and I have found our place in Vermont. On a cold October day, we matched up timber after timber, raising the frame we now call home. For us, this square of earth with its surrounding mountains and communities is where we feel most connected. The whisper of wind in the tall pines calls our attention to nature’s ways. The foundation of an old farmhouse reminds us who settled here first. Exchanges with neighbors reflect shared values. This anchor became more firmly lodged the day we drove home from the hospital with you and your first snowy winter when we didn’t leave the house at all.

I do not know what kind of world you will live in when you grow up-what your lives will be, where you will live, whom you will love. But I do know where I belong. And I’ll remember the day we sat in the meadow watching the bluebirds build a nest or visited the neighbor boiling sap. I hope to reminisce on the charm of town meeting and the simple ways your dad and I loved each other.

Austin and Carson, as you embark on journeys far and wide searching for the home that will root you, I hope a piece of our place will travel with you.