Tattoos on This Town

It sure left its mark on us
We sure left our mark on it
We let the world know we were here
With everything we did
We laid a lot of memories down
Like tattoos on this town
- Jason Aldean

Last week I drove past 8244 12th Ave S in Bloomington. It's the earliest home I have memories of and the house was pretty much as I remembered it. It's where the highchair tray fell on Suellen and cut her lip open. It's where I watched Casey Jones on TV. It's where our dog had her puppies in our wading pool. It's where my cousins Mark and David came over to play all the time. It's where I spent the Christmas my dad built the doll house for us. But that was a lifetime ago...

Sometimes I feel like I have so many "lifetimes ago".

It was a lifetime ago that I lived every spare moment outdoors around the Minneapolis chain of lakes...biking, swimming, boating, jogging, skating, sledding. It was a lifetime ago that I lived for marching band, and all the high school football and basketball games we played at - and the goofing off afterward with an amazing group of friends. It was a lifetime ago that I worked at Camp Tamarac, something that set me on paths I never could have imagined. It was a lifetime ago that I biked cross-country, lived for rock climbing, and hitchhiked to California.

There ain't a corner of this hallowed ground
That we ain't laughed or cried on
It's where we loved, lived and learned real stuff
It's everything we're made of

It was a lifetime ago I held my babies in my arms and nursed them and slept with them and carried them everywhere. It was a lifetime ago I homeschooled my girls. It was a lifetime ago that I became a La Leche League Leader so I could help other moms and then went on to serve on their international board. It was a lifetime ago that I went back to teaching and then decided to go back to school for my Masters.

Everything I do, I seem to do with such intensity. Maybe that's why moving on from one thing to the next makes each one seem like a separate lifetime. Someday, I want to write full time. And then it will seem like a lifetime ago that I started a school. This has been the most intense thing I have ever done. Sometimes my family complains I am distracted about things but it is hard for me to shut down when 300 families have placed their children in my care. When it becomes routine and boring and mundane, it will be time for me to move on.

Everywhere there we are
It hits me right in my heart

The most important tattoos though, are around my left ankle...

Sarah Theresa Laura