I’m sitting here in my bed, awake, looking through photos of an old friend of mine, and rain is beating down against my window. As the raindrops fall onto my window air conditioner, a few drops from time to time are hitting some metal piece of the unit and creating the sound of a tin roof. I’ve always been soothed by the sound of rain outside my window at night, and of all the nights for that calming rain to come, I needed it tonight.

    Growing up, moving around as much as we did, there wasn’t much in our lives that was constant. We didn’t have one house that we grew up in. There wasn’t one room that was always mine. But I loved it. I adored moving, I thought that moving to new places was deliciously enlightening. Even as a child, I appreciated the opportunities that traveling and living in different environments and cultures afforded me as I grew up.

    But as much as I adored it, naturally anyone can find comfort in something that’s constant, something that’s always there, something that’s dependable. Even the bravest adventurer feels most daring, most alive, when they know they have a port to return to.

    The sounds of rain on a tin roof remind me of the nights I would spend sleeping in my childhood best friend Naomi’s bedroom. As we laid in that brass bed, under my favorite blanket in the world, the sounds of rain meeting metal on a southern summer night would sing us to sleep. But just to make sure we were safe, that we felt secure, my friend’s Mother would sit in a rocking chair across the room, quietly reading the paper and watching over us as we fell asleep.

    Naomi’s family has been our longest and dearest family friends, for as long as I can remember they were always there. They lived in South Carolina in this brilliant old house that just breathed history. Their backyard was large and lived in, the wooden floors creaked perfectly as you walked across the room, and occasionally you could hear the house moan and creak with the arthritis of old age. But nothing was ever taken seriously in that house; everything was laughter and smiles. Even the history of the house was something to laugh at – in a community where history was recounted by mentioning that some historic figure had slept in this room or that room, this family dared to laugh at the seriousness of southern history. There was a bronze plaque attached to the wooden front steps leading up to their door. In a gorgeous old world typeface it said,

    “On this spot in 1842, nothing happened.”

    Whenever I’d return to their house after years of being apart, I’d see that sign as I walked up to the door and knew I was returning to a second home. A place where I was welcomed, loved, and secure.

    That inviting old house was a constant in a life of glorious instability. Every so often my family would travel to South Carolina to visit our friends. When I first became ill with the bone infection at 11, their house was my refuge. I went there once a year for several years, on my own, to escape to a world where everything stayed the same and I could pretend my life hadn’t changed as drastically as it had.

    But as you sit and you hear the sounds of your childhood beat against your bedroom window, looking back you realize that nothing is ever constant. It just seems that way. Instability was the reality; the escape to a world where nothing changed, that was the fantasy. It doesn’t mean it’s wrong or that it never existed; rather, from the perspective of childhood, the things you think will last forever are merely the viewing of a specific moment in time that we wish could live on well past when we grow old. If you wish long enough, you believe it to be so. I wished that house in South Carolina would always be there. That I would always have a safe haven somewhere not too far away, where the southern rain would sing against the rooftop while a loving eye watched over me as I slept.

    Things change because life is change. The children in that family have all grown up and moved away. The parents sold the house and moved to some place smaller that’s completely unknown to me. The people are the same, but the familiar setting is gone. One of so few constants in my life disappeared. Without that symbol of stability, so many things changed. So much of life was more frightening, more daunting; more real than it had ever seemed before. That risk of life was always there, but its edges were softened with a sense of constant security. No matter what came your way, you always had that safe haven to return to.

    So many safe havens are gone, both physical and emotional. Watching things you’ve taken for granted fall apart is never comforting, especially when it’s not within your power to change it. It’s always frightening. But the loss of this childhood haven reminds me that with the loss of one haven, another has taken its place. It may not look the same, it may not have the same sights, sounds, or smells. But it evokes those same feelings of safety, security, and love. Even when things are at their worst, when all of your havens dissolve, another refuge will always arise. Sometimes it may be hard to find, and sometimes we may not always see it for what it truly is. But I know no matter what happens in this lifetime, I will always have that tin roof to keep me safe from the rain.