Lessons from our trip to Utah: Volume 2

We missed Utah. Badly!

We thought we were doing fine-- enjoying our home up here in Seattle. We had convinced ourselves that we could possibly stay up here the rest of our lives and be happily content. We had congratulated ourselves on being so independent that we could live a thousand miles away from our family. We told ourselves that we actually preferred the Seattle climate to anything else...

And then we stepped off the plane, blinking in the harsh Utah sunlight, and realized that we were wrong. And although our skin instantly dried up and our lips became chapped, we felt we were coming home.

One night, while staying at my brother's house, Richard pulled me to the window and showed me the stars-- bright within a cloudless sky. I hadn't realized that it had been many months since I had seen them. How beautiful. Nights are darker in Utah, and the days are brighter. The sun felt differently (I know what you are thinking-- "thats what we call a sunburn Rachael!"). It might not be lush and green like Washington, but I love the mountains and canyons of Utah. There is nothing quite like it anywhere else.

We drove down to Provo, a town that I was initially loathe to ever live in, and I realized how much I had grown to love it over the four years I was there. Not that I especially like the plethura of chain fast food restaurants or the crowds of freshman, but I like what I became while I was there. In Provo I became a law school graduate, a wife, a friend, and a mother. Those are powerful memories.

Spending a week in Utah solidified our desire to live there again. It might not happen for a few years, but we will get there. And until then, we WILL enjoy our time here in Seattle. ITs nice to know that we can be happy anywhere-- well, maybe not in Kansas...but almost anywhere!