My favorite homecomings always take place at nightnot because of the darkness, but because of the light. I dont mind darkness, and sometimes, when it becomes a palpable quicksilver that shifts shape to fit inside every part of me, I even love it. But darkness is what it is because of the lightjust as light is made meaningful by darknessand when I come home its the light against the darkness that I wait for every time.
When I say homecoming, what Im talking about is the planes descent, when the grid of lights that map out our small lives below snaps into focus, into size. This high above everything, the lights blur into indistinct smears, phosphorescent blemishes on a silent and silenced landscape. My face is pressed up against the glass, attentive suddenly as I hadnt been hours ago to flight attendants and safety warnings. The clouds and the stars should be what I wait for, heavenly bodies beyond our imaginations, but I guess theres something about the surly bonds of earth and the lives we make there that I just cant look away from. This high above everything, the world belowmy small lifeseems too distant to be believed. But circle toward the ground a few thousand feet and the lights become signals and semaphores, every light standing in for you. Every line of cars moving down the highway casts a shadow from its headlights that feels, in the darkness, more sure than brick under my palms or under my feet. Our small lives have lit up the night, today and every day, this night and always, and every time the blessed surprise feels both familiar and strange, its own deep relief. Here we are still living. Weve sent lights up to guide you back home. Because by homecoming, I dont mean a celebrated return to some rarefied landscape of my sentimental imagination, just my return to whatever place was most recently the most familiar to me. Home is not a particular place, but something I carry with me. Something I send ahead of the rest of me so I can be greeted with semaphores, with night lights, something that awaits me every time.