Home for the Holidays

We are very excited. Austin may get home for the holidays. I wrote the following story for Austin to share with his friends, but I think it makes a good point, especially for anyone who may ever have to be away from their family. As a matter of fact, the secret that Austin knows and shares with his friends at the end of the story was written on a plaque that hung on my bedroom wall as a child. I never forgot it. May you all be home for the holidays. And may you keep Thanksgiving, Love, and the joyful spirit of Christmas in your hearts all year long.

- Ann

Austin’s Home

Some of the children in Mr. Munsell’s class were talking about their homes. One of the boys was very excited. His family was moving into a new house. He would have a room of his own! Some of the other children talked about their houses. One boy said he lived in an apartment instead of a house. Then Lance asked Austin, “What is your house like?”

“Which one?” asked Austin.

“How many do you have?” asked Lance.

“Only two houses right now,” said Austin. “But I have had more than two before.”

“Oh come on,” said Ryan. “That’s just a story. Better get the green book. Nobody has two houses except maybe the President or a king!”

“Yes you can,” said one of the other boys. “I used to live in another city. So I had two houses, too.”

“Well, I have too had more than two houses. Not at the same time, of course, but I have lived in more than two.”

“Well then, Austin, where is your home?” said Destiny.

“Yeah, tell us about your houses, “ said Ian.

“OK,” said Austin. “My first house and the house I live in now are the same. My Mom is in the Air Force and when I was born she came home to Texas to have me. But then she had to leave me with Grandma and go back to Germany and find us a house so I could come and live with her. Grandma works at a guard company. People thought it was funny to see a little baby sleeping peacefully around all those guns and things.”

“Finally, Mom found a house for us. When I was one, I went to live in our house in Germany. It was an apartment on the second floor. Our landlady lived downstairs. I called her Oma, which means Grandma in German. It was really cold and snowed a lot! We had to wear our warm clothes all the time.”

“Wow,” said Cameron. “I wish it would snow here.”

“Then,” Austin continued,” we got on a big plane and flew to Florida. After what seemed like a long time, a big truck came with our furniture and all my toys. In Florida we had a little tiny house. I had a room that was so little I had to put my chest of drawers in the living room. That house had a basement and I could play with my leggos there. We lived there for a pretty long time. I started school there in kindergarten. Once Mama had to go to Italy for three months, so I came back to Texas to stay with Grandma. Then I had two houses again. Thank goodness for telephones! Even if I couldn’t see her, I could talk to my mom on the phone. I am glad Mr. Bell invented telephones. Maybe I will be an inventor when I grow up.” 

Austin looked a little sad. “I miss my Mama,” he said. “I love my Grandma and I like to visit her and my first house. But I want my Mama!”

“Anyway,” he continued, ”I went back to Florida and back to school with my friends. Florida was hot and sunny almost all the time. Once we had a hurricane and had to evacuate. Mama had to stay and work so I went with her friend to another state until the hurricane was over. Mama put her motorcycle and much of our stuff in the living room so it wouldn’t get wet. Our house was OK, but water did get in the basement and ruin some things, but we were safe and that is what is most important. We like our things, but they are never as important as the people.”

When I was in kindergarten, Mom got orders to Okinawa. That is an island at the tip of Japan. The whole island, the entire country, is smaller than the Houston area. I came to stay with Grandma again. I started to go to school here at Red School. I loved my teacher Mrs. Orem, and she loved me, too. Now she has a baby boy of her own to love.”

Some of the children knew Mrs. Orem. They loved her too. They were glad she had a baby of her own, but they wished she would come back and teach at Red School again. 

“While I stayed with Grandma, Mama flew to Okinawa to find us a house there. She found an apartment on the second floor. It is Okinawa style. Most of the people in Okinawa don’t have chairs and couches like we do. When I visit our landlady, I squat on the floor, sitting down on my heels. She sometimes makes tea for me out of little china cups and we eat sushi with our chopsticks. The floors are tatami mats, so we take off our shoes inside the house. Our house doesn’t have walls like the houses in Texas. The walls are screens made of paper!”
The children gasped. Cameron said, “Paper! Oh, Austin, you must have to be quiet or people in the next room could hear you.”

“That is correct,” said Austin. “At home, I have to be quiet. Sometimes at night my Mama says `Be quiet, Austin.’ Then I laugh because it isn’t me. It is my pet chipmunk who likes to stay awake and run around in his cage at night. My house in Okinawa is right next to a little park. It has a cement slide and some benches and the children from the neighborhood play there. We have fun together. They speak Japanese and I speak English, but we smile in the same language, and we laugh in the same language, too. My friends go to Japanese school and they right from top to bottom on their paper; we write from left to right across the page. Their writing looks funny to me. And my writing looks funny to them! We are different, but we are alike, too. We are all just happy kids playing together.”

“I go to school on the base where Mama works. I went to Bob Hope Elementary School. Mr. Hope is a famous movie actor who is very funny. His picture is at our school just like Mr. Red’s picture is here. My Mom is coming to get me pretty soon. I can’t wait! We will go back to Okinawa. When I go back, I won’t go to Bob Hope School any more. I will go to Amelia Earhart School. She was a famous American lady pilot. I’ll bet her picture is at the school. Maybe all schools do that. 

When I get back to Okinawa, I will study martial arts with Master Eric again. Here I study with Master Kim. That’s funny. In Japan I have an American teacher for tae kwon do. And here in America, I have a Korean teacher! 

You know, Okinawa is usually pretty hot and the sun is much brighter there than it is here.”

Mr. Munsell had just been listening, but now he said, “Austin, do you know why the sun is hotter in Okinawa than it is here?”

“No, sir,” Austin said.

All the other children began shaking their heads. They knew Mr. Munsell was going to ask them that same question. They thought he would tell them the answer. He didn’t. He told them, “I will give you a hint. My hint is the word `equator.’ Maybe you can look in your geography book or at a map and figure out why the sun is so hot in Okinawa.”

“Awwww,” the children sighed. They thought, “That Mr. Munsell! He thinks we are so smart and he always makes us figure out the answer to things.”

“So why are you here now, Austin?” asked Denise. “Where is your mom?”

“Mom had to go to work in Saudi Arabia for a while,” Austin explained. “That’s her job. We might have a war, so she is working for the United States because she loves our country and wants to keep it safe. She isn’t getting shot at or anything like that right now. She just works in an office and tells people where to send their trucks and supplies. I ask God every night to keep her safe and to help us find a way to make peace so Mom can come home in December. Besides, she said it is way too hot over there. It is a dessert. Sand and dust everywhere. And really really really big lizards!”

“Your Mom is coming home in December?” asked Ryan. “Cool, dude. Where will you live then?”

Austin said, “When Mom gets off the plane from Saudi, first I am going to hug her until her guts come out her ears!”

The children laughed. Austin showed them a picture he had made of himself hugging his Mom that hard. The children laughed even harder.

Austin continued, “We will stay a few days with Grandma. My Grandma calls my Mama her `little girl’ and says that even if she lives to be a hundred and Grandma is a million years old that Mama will still be her `baby girl.’ Mom doesn’t call me a baby – she says I am her `little man.’ Anyway, then we will get on a plane and fly back to Okinawa. Grandma will probably cry; she always cries when we leave. We will probably sleep. It takes us about twelve hours to get back to our house in Okinawa.”

“But Austin,” demanded Ryan, “If you have so many houses, which one is your real home?”

Austin just smiled at first. Then he began to laugh out loud. Austin told him he knew something kind of like a secret. At first he was going to keep it to himself, but then he decided to share what he knew.


Austin said, “Oh silly, don’t you know? Houses aren’t important! It doesn’t matter if you live in a big house or a little house or an apartment. It doesn’t matter if your house is in Texas or Florida or Germany or Okinawa. 
Home is where your heart is!  So, no matter where we are, my heart is with my Mom and we are home.”