Two years ago this week, I emigrated. I stuffed the things I thought I needed (a stack of German grammar guides, my racing bike) into two suitcases and boarded an Airbus to Munich - with a one-way ticket.

I left for inconsequential reasons (escapist Wanderlust) and never planned to stay. It was an interlude between grad school and law school, I told myself, a short-term and largely spontaneous cross-cultural "experience." Staying was not an option. It was not on the table.

But one year turned to two, and when I recently sat still long enough to make a serious inventory of my life here in Germany, the richness and fullness of it took my breath away: my partner, the love of my life; an intimate collection of Ex-pat and German friends; a tiny adorable apartment with inadequate pre-war heating; a meaningful spiritual home (www.peacechurch.de); the seemingly endless frustrations and surprises of living in a foreign country. For two years, I'd remained exclusively focused on going "home" again for law school. It was the Plan (even when I had my persistent doubts; see previous post). The German Experiment was nearing completion, I thought. It was time to go "home" - right?

(Wouldn't it be nice if we made our own plans?)

A few weeks ago, my pastor Christine read this text from the pulpit, and her words went like a straight pin through my heart and fastened me to my chair.

"This is what the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, says to all those I carried into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: "Build houses and settle down; plant gardens and eat what they produce. Marry and have sons and daughters... Seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the LORD for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper."

I'm not normally the "I heard from the Lord today" type of Quaker. I don't believe, generally, in signs and visions and whispers and neon fingers in the sky. But at that moment in the Peace Church meeting hall, in the midst of community, my partner beside me, as Christine's voice came down from the pulpit, it was as clear as any finger writing on the wall could have been. Stay! It was like a bell was tolling high and clear in my heart. Stay! Put down roots and call this place home.

Easier said than done, I readily confess. And what does that mean, anyway? A moment of clarity is always followed by many sleepless nights. After long talks with my partner, I asked for - and was granted - a one-year deferral to law school. I've cried a lot recently. (A lot.) (Really, a lot.) I don't know what's next; I don't know what this country, this life, this relationship, this Wonderland world holds next for me. But when I manage to stop hysterically hyperventilating long enough to remove the paper bag from my mouth, I realize what extraordinary beauty and richness is already present in my life. I have a space where I feel well; relationships with people who love, respect and cherish me (and whom I cherish deeply in return); a spiritual community; a deep sense of the goodness of my life. While the German language and culture often still seem strange to me, at some point they ceased to be a serious hindrance to maintaining a sense of security and rootedness in this place of self-imposed 'exile.' I don't feel like a foreigner in a strange land anymore. There was no cross-over moment, no lightening bolt, but at some point in the past weeks I realized: I am already home.

What does home mean to you? Is it a place you carry inside you, or a half-magical world that opens when that Someone(s) walk through the door? Is it a church community, a blood family, or a make-shift, patched-together collage of attracted souls?