Home from Home

We were away on holiday last week, a delicious Summer week spent with my family beside the sea. Now that I am back home in Yorkshire, I'm experiencing that familiar heavy-hearted melancholy that always descends on me following a week spent in Dorset. I am naturally very attached to my childhood Dorset home, to the countryside and coastline that I grew up in that holds so many layers of memories and emotions. When I am there, I feel the tendrils of nostalgia creeping into my soul and wrapping themselves around my heart. It always feels like a physical thing to me, I feel my heart squeeze with the pure pleasure of being back where I belong, and I feel  a very strong pull to stay there and never ever leave.

But of course I have to leave, I have to come home from home. I have to travel the 300 miles north and ease myself back into the present, into the gentle familiarity of this life I am living here in Yorkshire. I feel the ache of the separation, but from experience I know it won't last long. The longing to be beside the sea will gradually subside and really I am glad to be back.

 The last photo above is the view out of my bedroom window in Dorset. It's the bedroom I slept in as a child, and the bedroom that J and I sleep in when we stay in Dorset. The house I grew up in was a small three-bedroomed semi on a 1970's housing estate. The houses were purpose built by a local housing association and known as "social housing", being rented out to low income families and retired pensioners. The Low Income thing gave them a bit of a stigma locally, but as a child I don't remember being overly bothered by the fact that we were seen as being poor for living there. I loved my bedroom! I loved living there with that view and being only 2 miles from the sea which I loved more than anything.

We had an amazing holiday last week, day after day of hot summer weather, glorious countryside, scenic views and fun family times. I took a LOT of pictures (almost 600 I think!) and I'm really going to enjoy stringing them into some sort of a holiday story to share here on my blog. A story of long summer days, happy times and simple pleasures......

 

♥...more litytle snippets from the Attic...♥

Autumn Wreath :: Ta-dah!

A Coat Story

Comments

[mahek]

Very sweetly written Lucy
Your writing is so warm and real and that's why your blog is always no 1 in my heart.

[Andrea Kanyo]

This clear blue sky and the green green grass in England is AMAZING!

[Louisa]

We were there last week :) love it do much and never want to come back, beautiful photos as always

[Michelle]

Thank you for sharing your lovely memories - my heart is in Cheddar Gorge I remember visiting it as a little girl and took an instant like to it - even now I am a lot older I love going back there xx

[ime rože]

Lovely photos, holidays and colours. I am looking forward to see your following memories from this nice and peaceful part of the world in England and also to see my mandala and fresh photos in Pinterest album of Yarndale. I believe that "mandala time" is cooming very soon.:)

[Annie]

Beautiful view from your childhood home!

[Carol D]

Good to hear from you, Lucy. I was a bit worried, since your last couple of posts indicated you were not feeling quite yourself...
May we assume you are feeling better and back to our lively, happy Lucy?
Though we've never met - and likely never will - feel like I have a friend 'across the pond' and was concerned about your health.

Think all of us feel the same...we love you, Lucy and want you to be well!

[Bekah]

Great photos! Looks like a lovely trip :)

[sue witt]

we have traced family to dorset so visit often now, and its very beautiful, and a little bit undiscovered in places. Love reading your words, reminds me of seaside memories x

[Joyce Smith]

Lovely photos Lucy

[Kontorartikler]

Beautiful pictures :-) Nice to have something to remember this great summer from :-)

[Anna-Marie Field]

I love the view from your bedroom!!!! I also love the name of your post "Home from Home" It's wonderful to have that and to have happy childhood memories is very specia!!!! Enjoy getting back to the daily chores and have a happy week!!!
Love
AMarie xxx

[Carole C]

Wonderful photos as always,Lucy.I really love the sunset beach one with the late paddlers and fishermen...it reminds me of two holidays we spent at an idyllic cottage on the coastal path ,just outside Abbotsbury....we could just wander down in the evening to the shore and watch the sun setting...perfect :)
It's hard when the sea is in our blood and a once or twice-yearly visit provides a fix, but leaves us yearning for more.
Holidays are wonderful,but can be unsettling indeed !
Best wishes from land-locked SW France ,
Carole x

[Ali]

You always manage to capture England's green and pleasant land !! ( and coastline!!) :) Glad you had a lovely break . Ali

[Claudia]

Last week we were also in Dorset. I’m really looking forward to seeing your pictures.
Our first trip always goes to Lyme Regis, for me the most beautiful place on the coast, I wish I was at home there. First we visit the “Hat Shop” from Alison Tutcher. Whenever we are in Lyme, Alison makes me a new hat and the new one is wonderful, I love her work. Because the weather was so beautiful, I could wear the hat immediately when it was finished after a week.
We had two wonderful weeks and for us the 800 kilometers of travelling to Dorset have been worthwhile.
Claudia x

[Jacquie]

I hear you Lucy and feel exactly the same about Yorkshire when I visit. I come home mulling over the possibilities of moving or having some sort of base there, but it does fade as you say. You are raising your family in a beautiful part of the world and I'm sure they will feel the same way about their childhood landscape as you do, plus Dorset will hold a special place in their hearts too.
Jacquie x
Sorry you weren't going later in the hols though :0)

[Maya]

Thank you so much for your blog today. I really needed it - I get so much enjoyment from reading your blog and looking at your beautiful pictures. Yesterday a colleague of mine was shot and killed on the job and no i don't work with police or military - i'm an ecologist. It has shaken me deeply. But you can still make me smile with your beautiful pictures and make me feel that the world is beautiful.

Thank You - I really needed that today.

[Dawn Williamson]

I was so inspired by your photos and stories about Dorset, that we are going on holiday Ito lyme Regis in a couple of weeks! Even more excited now!

[Deirdre]

So good to hear you had a break, you've been working hard lately & you needed some time off. Last year my husband & I spent a week touring the West Country & we spent some time in Lyme Regis, we thought it was beautiful...the Dorset coastline is spectacular but four years ago I spent a week in Yorkshire, we visited Skipton & had a very enjoyable tour of the castle & spent a few hours looking around the town. Dorset, Yorkshire...very different but both beautiful in their own way

[CJ]

What a lovely view from your bedroom. It sounds as if you have some very happy memories of your childhood. I know what you mean about the pull of the coast, I feel it too, it's always very hard to leave. I hope you're fully re-entered into normal life soon. CJ xx

[Wendy Rance]

As always Lucy your photography is beautiful. Makes me want to visit Dorset from my corner of the world - one day maybe.

[Jo]

happy holiday memories. I am lucky to be in my home county, you have made me more grateful today. Jo x

[Leah]

Gorgeous pics xxx

[Marta]

<3 the life is beautiful memories it's part of who we are!

[ann clements]

I live over the border in devon, was born and bred here and cant think of living anywhere else, I love the sea glad you had a lovely holiday