“Rufus.”  That’s what I’ve decided to name my little plaid carry-on.  It has a ring to it, like that of a faithful companion.

Now, Rufus has been back and forth and up and down coasts with me this past summer.  He’s put in scores of hours and miles of travel and has been a trooper through all of the TSA examinations I’ve subjected him too.  I’ve greatly appreciated his company.  There’s no doubt, he’s been good to me.  However, there inevitably comes a point in every young vagabond’s life when she needs a little bit of space from her suitcase.  Or a lot of space.  Closet space, actually.  And that time has come.

Dear Rufus, I’ve had enough.  I can’t do this anymore.  It’s me not you.

Now as I gear up for one more move of what I hope will be the last one for a while, I look back on this last season of constant travel and see another kind of baggage that I’ve been carrying around with me.  This one, though, is not the kind that weighs me down but actually imparts strength back to me.  It’s been the seat to my weary body, the pillow to my heavy-eyed head, the Mary Poppins bag for my every need including ones I didn’t even know that I had.  It’s been and is my support system, and it’s all of the people that I love.

It’s all of the people that love me.

Ralph Waldo Emerson once said,

“Though we travel the world over to find the beautiful, we must carry it with us or we find it not.“

And so to the beautiful in my life, the ones whose food I have eaten, couches I have crashed, lives I have interrupted only to leave with my own bags overflowing with encouragement, thank you, thank you, thank you.  I don’t know what else to say, save for the fact that I would not be who I am today had my life not divinely intersected with yours.  You are my blessings.  You are the beautiful I carry around with me, always and gladly, and I have the adventures that I have not because I’m trying to get away from something terrible but because I anchored to something wonderful.

In a season of so much change, your love is my constant.

Thank you again and a million times over.

May the Lord continue to bless you and keep you.  May the Lord make His face shine upon you, and be gracious to you.  May the Lord lift up His countenance upon you, and give you peace that you may continue to be a blessing to others.