Soon, I’ll be flushing the family toilets again.

Tonight is my last night here at Mt. Hermon.  [For details of my adventure last night with Barbara, check out her blog, Mommylife.net.  She wrote about our efforts to find the ocean (go west, young middle-aged women!).]  What fun I’ve had chatting with her and monopolizing her time  spending time with her.  We took a picture together tonight (which I’ll post in a day or two when I get home), but I’m afraid I’m having a bad hair day, so do not expect a Glamour-Shot. 

Aside from the professional networking and workshops, the stretch of days has refreshed me in a way that I hadn’t realized I even needed.  I’ve been able to think without interruption, read without the distraction of FOX News in the background, and jot down ideas in margins of legal pads that may someday work their way into print.  I feel more focused on my goals and on what I hope to achieve as a writer.  I feel a sense of stillness and hope.  And I’m even comfortable now saying, “I’m a writer.”  (After all, I have business cards to prove it.)

Anyway, tomorrow at 5:30 p.m., I’ll be boarding a plane, heading home.  I will be sorry to say good-bye to the towering Redwoods and to the beautiful campus here, but I take home with me a good supply of peace and nourishment, hopefully enough to get me through the pile of laundry I predict awaits me and the stinky kitty litter box which has most likely been forgotten in my absence.

I just hope someone’s been flushing the toilets while I was away.