the ache for home.

The ache for home lives in all of us, the safe place where we can go as we are and not be questioned.

- Maya Angelou

There is something about returning to Tennessee every so often that just makes my heart soften and my mind slow down, something that is refreshing + reassuring + rejuvenating... and just the vacation this auntie/sister {whose own ache{s} for home make her wish she was one of those trust fund babies who inherited a super early retirement, a Cessna + a pilot} needed. Currently, Knoxville {knox-vull, as the locals say} is the map dot that emanates the strongest feeling of being home, you know that sense of relief when you pull in the driveway or that peaceful state you find yourself in when your head hits the extra-feathery pillow at night? That home. At first it was funny to me to be boarding a plane destined for Knox because the Rocky Top has never been my actual home {Read: my sister is the only soul I know there.} but the more I think about it, the only constant in the definition of home growing up was, in fact, my sister so it's most apropos that the simple, sleepy, Southern town with sweet tea on tap is presently where my childhood memories are safely kept... some in the attic, some in the garage... but most live on in the special bond that is a sister. We sistered all weekend... adoring all over Reese, watching a little March Madness live in Nashville, hosting a fabulous St. Patty's Day pancake party, drawing something + giggling like mischievous, little girls trying to get their babysitter fired {We would never do that.} way past our bedtimes...