Almost Home from Camp

Hannah is home from piano camp. Well, she’s almost home. She left pieces of herself behind in the practice room, in the dorm, with her professors, with her new friends.

It is a gradual leaving that is occurring in my home, with my oldest. She is teetering on 16 with two years of high school left. And as her passions in life carry her to places with people who share common interests, parts of her stay behind with them, waiting for her to return. Waiting for the day she can join them and immerse herself into the life she loves, for more than just a week of camp. A life where the piano is her home and her family members are professors, musicians, an audience.

During the car ride home, she told me all about her week of music. Nothing but music all day long. She told me about music classes that her dad and brother and I would hate… long and boring… Nothing but music all day long. Then she said:

“But I loved it!”

There was so much passion in her voice that I felt another little piece of her slip out the car window and float back to the world she left behind.

For now she is home. In her own bedroom. With her old, out of tune piano. With her chores and her babysitting jobs and her small, private high school awaiting her return.

But someday she’ll be reunited with the missing pieces of her. She will go off and study music. All day. Every day. She will love it.

Then, she will leave pieces of herself here, in my home, with me. But today she is home from camp. Almost.