Belonging
Day 17 of 31: 200 Words-a-Day Challenge
The rules for our challenge are simple. If you need my prompt below, use it. If not, still write. JUST WRITE....as many words as you need to…about whatever you want to write.
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Belonging
As I arrived in my dad’s driveway last Tuesday, he was on his way back from the hospital in Asheville with my stepmom. She had hip surgery recently after a bad fall, followed by complications that kept her there longer than expected. I’ve come to, hopefully, be of aid.
Usually, when I’m here, it’s a relaxed, planned visit, and for the last handful of years—pandemic excepted—my dad and I have taken trips together, mostly to places of some historical significance. We are both history buffs.
I wished I’d realized at an earlier age how many interests we share. He raised me from age two to eight by himself until he married my (now deceased) first stepmother. Like many kids who grew up in the 1960s and ‘70s (the decade of the highest U.S. divorce rate), I have a fractured family. This circumstance, even though it’s complicated and there’ve certainly been dark times, has given me a lot of people and spend time with and to love.
But the place where I feel the greatest sense of belonging is in the presence of my father. We call him ‘Pop’ and ‘Poppy.’
Pop and I exchange books often, and he recently loaned me the memoir by CBS correspondent Michelle Miller, about her search for her mother and how she fits into the world. I finished it here, last night, where I am in Pop’s presence. It’s a great read.
The memoir’s title is Belonging.
Your Prompt / Day 17 of 31
What has been your experience of fitting or not fitting into the world? Where or with whom have you felt the greatest sense of belonging? And what does that word mean to you?
Please share what you write by posting into the comments or via Notes. And to comment on others’ shared writing: (1) be kind, (2) don’t critique unless explicitly requested, (3) tell the writer what in their writing resonated with you, made you think differently, or was an ‘aha’ for you.
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