You can take the American out of Belgium...

Today marks the 4 month anniversary of my return to the US. And as a consequence of now being almost completely reacclimated into the American way of life, there are some days that I forget about Europe, or Belgium, or the fact that I lived there for two years. Other days, I miss it. A lot. I have listed dozens of reasons of why I love Europe, and a dozen more about what I had missed about the States. The fact is, after you have lived in another place for a long period of time, and truly enjoyed your time there, it is hard to feel completely settled anywhere, including your original "home." There is a quote that articulates this idea better than I can:

Where We Are
i envy those
who live in two places:
new york, say, and london;
wales and spain;
l.a. and paris;
hawaii and switzerland.
there is always the anticipationof the change, the chance that what is wrong
is the result of where you are.
i have always loved both the freshness of arriving and the relief of leaving.
with two homes every move would be a homecoming.
i am not even considering the weather, hotor cold, dry or wet:
i am talking about hope.
-gerald locklin

Belgium isn't home anymore, but at times I do ache to be back. In the meantime, I am truly enjoying the perks of being an Iowan again.

The cause for the delay in this post is because this is also the first post that won't be read by this blog's most avid reader, my mom, Karen Luthringer, who passed away mid-September. I miss her every day, and acknowledge that without her encouragement (and occasional badgering) many of these blogs would have taken a lot longer to write. :)