Ants

I was watching ants today.  Ok, I know I have too much time on my hands, but instead of staring meaningfully into the middle distance, I stared meaningfully into the close distance.  That was when my eyes fell upon the ants.
We have a number of them.  No doubt they number in at least the thousands.  Different colonies follow different trails.  Some are up really high, which is often a characteristic of imminent rain.  The ones I saw today, followed a way I had never seen them do before.
I had moved pot plants.  My goal was for us – not them.  What I have found amazing is how they have made a home at the bottom of the pot.  I looked where they were going.  They walked along and then disappeared.  Where they disappeared to was under a pot plant stand.  The thing was maybe a centimetre high but that was enough.  It was their home.
I don’t think all the ants going there were attending a house warming or anything.  It looked like that was home for the ants, and they were going to get on with whatever they were doing.
It made me think, “any place is home.”  As they say “home is where the heart is.” In the ants’ case, it seems home is any place babies can be looked after in peace.  Peace for them is not a given, (certainly not if they are at a place I want to be) but it is a chance they are willing to take.
I like our home.  In fact I love our home.  We are trying to do all we can, to get it the way we want it.  We feel that is particularly important as we age.  There are things I can’t and won’t do that I did once.  No doubt when we are looked upon as “older folk” many presents will come our way.  It is ok, there is room.
People come over for table tennis and we have folk over for dinner.  We are big on parties.  For a club I was with, we called our office in the shed the “World Headquarters.”  Well it was.  We have had deep and meaningfuls here.  Why?  Because we wanted to, and we could.
I don’t want it to be tested, but the ants made me think, home is more about who with, than location.  As I say, I do love our house and do not want it any other way, but I need to make sure the house is not priority number one.  I get a chance to do heaps, but it is great to come back to this base.  Thankfully this base also enables us to do things we might not be able to do otherwise. Merril and I are both “people, people.” Can you say that?  Well obviously you can because I just did.  “People, people.”  I just said it again.
We love having people over, and we want them to feel comfortable here.  In fact, we make them feel so comfortable, that in some cases, if they want it, they can do it themselves.
Anyway like the ants, it seems to me home is a means to an end, and not an end in itself.