For 45 years, I’ve traveled to Sweden. And for 44 years, I’ve had to open my hands and let go at the airport. Often it was because I was leaving. Sometimes it was because people had come to visit and they were leaving me. I know when I left 44 years ago, I had never cried so hard in all my life. For months.

Maybe I knew even then that that particular dream, however lovely, wasn’t mine.

But mostly it’s because Love is such a sticky thing, it binds you. And deep and true friendship doesn’t happen every day…

A young woman asked me the other day, “don’t you miss Sweden when you leave? Don’t you miss Lorraine?” Oh, I do, I replied, but I love my home, my friends, my work, my family. My life is unbelievably sweet…

And yet… one of the sweetest parts of my heart lives across the ocean from me. I see these beloved friends far more often than most people see old friends, because it’s a priority for me… I need those doses of both love and difference.

But oh, the airport. A place of joy, because journey’s are exciting. And a place of deep sadness as you open your heart and hands and let go the Peace and Love that live here…

I have a whole flight to anticipate the Peace and Love at home and gradually allow this Peace to enrich the memories I already carry in my heart. Farväll…vi ses…