I’m always amazed at what shows up when least expected. This photo for one.

It was taken back in 1996 or so. I came back to Nebraska to visit Mom and this space. I had been returning since my folks had purchased their land in the late 1970’s.

Mom and Dad had been invited to visit the area, and both fell in love with the land and the people – the neighboring ranchers and farmers, working stewards of the landscape. 

I knew why my folks loved the land, though I never saw myself living here. I was a beach person, a West Coaster, who loved the salt water and the aroma of sea kelp in the air.

This land is dry, and California is moist. On the coast, my hair was permanently frizzy and big. Here, in Nebraska, my curls lie flat, windblown and crispy. No matter the season, the air is dry on the High Plains of Nebraska.

Only after a rainstorm humidity is present . Thank heaven for rain.

Initially, I felt like I was in the movie Big Fish. The lead film star, Albert Finney, sits in the bathtub, water up to his chin, and tells his family, “I’m drying out.” That was me. I understood his character. That was how I felt whenever I visited Nebraska– drying out.

Yet, it was only a few years later, that my husband and I packed everything up, including the two dogs and an elderly cat, and retired to Nebraska.

Could I come to terms with the Nebraska Panhandle, becoming my home?

Yet, after a long flight with the cat in its carrier, my husband drove us out to our property — twenty-five miles from town, 17 miles of dirt and gravel road.

As we drove up our final mile – our rutted driveway I felt everything, my past, my future, “Now I am home. Really home.”

I hadn’t realized that, somehow, I had drifted from home. The home of who I am—the home of all of me.

Reflecting on this picture, I see that my life was beginning to bloom. I had only existed. I was happy. I had a strong marriage and two daughters, now adults with their own adventures.

Yet, at this point, here in Nebraska, I saw that I was not growing into my whole self. 

I had kept that part of me, my unique skills, those of a medium, carefully guarded, hidden most of my life.

I decided then that it was time to become a complete Regina. So here I am, more than 20 years after I first came home to Nebraska. I am living my dream. I am a daughter, a wife, a mother, an adventurer, a photographer, a writer, and a medium.

Best of all, I am still evolving into more of me. Nebraska has given me this gift.

I am so happy to call her Home.