First, thank you to Anne for her wise guest blogs. Those hard-to-begin apples came to mind as I sorted through my accumulated emails. Second, this is your blog on some serious jetlag, so I’m going to keep it short. If it doesn’t also come out sweet, I beg your indulgence until my brain and I are reconnected in the same time zone next week.

I was in transit for a few days, which gave me the odd feeling of being location-less. Place began to slip away at the fancy airport hotel that lacked any hint of Greece except the stuffed grape leaves at the buffet. It disappeared altogether during a surreal sprint through the Vienna airport—picture any dream you’ve had about trying to get somewhere and failing, give it to Kafka for rendering, and you’ve got a good idea of being between terminals in Vienna. And finally, I spent a night in New York City but a New York City without subways and almost without sidewalks as my cousin picked me up from the airport and a car delivered me back to it at 4 a.m. the next day.

All of which made me grateful that I belong to a certain spot of Earth. The oak trees on the hills began to place me during the drive from LA. While I was eating lunch on my first full day back, a hummingbird came by to check out the Mexican sage by my bench. Greece and California look a lot alike, but I didn’t see any hummers while I was there.

So to all the people, creatures, and plants, the smell of the air and the feel of the soil, the ocean and the hills, and even the In ‘N Out hamburger joints, thank you for making this place home.