Return to Grace

After a little over a month of temple life and traveling, I'm here with Grace again and her crew that have welcomed me so warmly back into their fold. It is both wondrous and occasionally unsettling for me to feel so very much at home in two very different places.

The transition is the hardest part. At the moment, I feel as if I have one foot in each location. Sometimes, when I sleep, I dream I hear the temple bells. But when I was at the temple, I would always get up too early, thinking I had to make coffee so the crew could start their day.

After all the ceremonies and teachings and rituals, it admittedly feels somewhat peculiar to be curled here on the couch with the soup simmering on the stove, surrounded by the various faint metallic sounds that Grace tends to make when we are docked and she grows bored. It is cozy, however, and quite pleasant. I wonder who will wake up first.

I wasn't sure how it would feel to see Hatch again after these weeks away, if something would have changed between us, if time apart meant we'd be closer or more distant for the experience. But he is still the Hatch that I have known and come to love so dearly, with his rambling words and his heart that is bigger than the whole Universe and then some. His patience and devotion fill me with awe. Each time I learn glimpses of his very different past, I am even more impressed that he has become the man he is today.

There are new people. Sirah is a very beautiful and elegant Companion. Yesterday evening, she tried to teach me how to waltz, which I found amusing. I suppose I must not look much like someone who already knows such a refined social skill. There is also her brother Sander, whom I have yet to see (but I hear he is a Preacher), and Peeper whom I glimpsed once but who seems to be particularly shy. I think there might even be a new engineer lost somewhere in the engine room, but I have no proof.

Did I mention that Bishop made cookies the other day? They were really good!