Loose Threads: On Place
Incomplete thoughts, loosely connected to place and belonging.
Recently, a dear friend spent the week with me, house-hunting as she and her kids prepare to move to the area. I spent several days driving around town with her and showing her all the sights. Acting as her tour guide stirred a deep affection for the place I’ve called home for the past twenty-five years.
Nostalgia was a key ingredient in those stirred affections. I found myself writing an ode to the frozen custard shop that was once the gathering place on Main Street (back before they paved paradise and put up a parking garage). I took a stroll down memory lane with my description of hot summer evenings, roll-up garage doors, noisy rotating fans, and minty-green grasshopper sundaes.
But nostalgia wasn’t the only emotion I felt. The affection wasn’t just rooted in the past, but in the present. As I drove down familiar roads and introduced my friend to the places where I live my life, I felt a settled sense of belonging. This is my town. I belong to this place, and it belongs to me.
These reflections on place and belonging aren’t new; for months, the topic has held my attention. My journal is full of “threads,” loosely related to the idea of place. Some are only snips, like the print in my living room that reads, “This place right here,” or the song lyric, “I want to be where my feet are.” Some threads, though, are slowly unspooling, untangling in my mind.
Loose Threads is a place to jot down some of those ideas, to untangle them aloud and listen for the connective threads. These aren’t complete thoughts; often they’re little more than a quote that resonates. If there’s a pattern woven into these threads, it hasn’t yet appeared. But I believe there’s value in writing down these incomplete thoughts and saying them aloud. I know that process is valuable for me, and I pray it serves you, too.
1st Loose Thread: This Is My Land
Joshua 15 is a turning point in the book of Joshua — it begins to recount the land allotments for each of the tribes of Israel. On the surface, it’s a dry, repetitive read: “And the boundary goes up to the top of the mountain that lies over against the Valley of Hinnom, on the west, at the northern end of the Valley of Rephaim. Then the boundary extends from the top of the mountain to the spring of the waters of Nephtoah, and from there to the cities of Mount Ephron.” That’s just a sample; sixty-three verses are given to Judah’s allotment alone.
The description falls flat to our ears, but imagine you’re a Hebrew woman from the tribe of Judah, hearing those same words. Imagine the Valley of Rephaim as the plains that lie just beyond the door of your house. What if the waters of Nephtoah were the cold, fresh springs you splashed in as a child? Picture Mount Ephron as your mother’s hometown, or the place your grandparents were buried. Suddenly, the land allotments aren’t so dull.
When I put myself in the shoes of that Hebrew woman, my whole perspective changes. This is not an abstract piece of land; this is my land. This is the inheritance that the LORD God of Israel has given to me and my family. The land allotments are a map, rich in detail, of the place of my belonging.
2nd Loose Thread: Choosing a Place
Bookish descriptions are a nerdy pleasure: a character-driven plot, a coming-of-age story, or an epistolary novel. 🤓 As a book nerd, I gravitate toward books that “evoke a strong sense of place.” Two novels from my recent reading stand out as representatives: Tom Lake by Ann Patchett and Time of the Child by Niall Williams. Their settings couldn’t be more different; one takes place in Michigan in summer and the other in Ireland during Christmastide. But both authors transport you to their respective places; I could almost taste fresh cherries while reading Tom Lake, while Williams’ setting made me shiver.
The sense of place was communicated not just in descriptions, but through the characters themselves. The fleeting thoughts of two supporting characters reflected a settled sense of belonging:
In Tom Lake: “Benny hadn’t missed the fact that other lives were available to him; it was just that the choice he liked best was the one that sprang to life beneath the tires of his bike.”
In Time of the Child: “Although… like all small places it was confining, Ronnie had come to the understanding that for her it was also freeing and she never wanted to leave it. This was home. More, with a conviction she knew could not be explained, she felt it was where she was supposed to be.”
These characters didn’t just receive a place, but they chose that place. The place they received was the choice they liked best, the place they never wanted to leave.
3rd Loose Thread: A Settled Sense of Belonging
There’s a danger of romanticizing a place, and I’m an easy target. (My ode to the custard shop is a case in point.) Life isn’t a novel, and places aren’t always idyllic. Once-peaceful places can be disrupted. Summer among the Michigan cherry trees gives way to a bitter Midwest winter.
Not only do places change, but we change places. We leave behind what’s familiar and dear for the unknown and new. We may greet the new place with eagerness or trepidation, joy or grief.
Despite the changing nature of place, and even with the risk of rose-colored glasses, I believe in the goodness of our places. You and I each live within a story that “evokes a strong sense of place.” Like the Hebrew woman in the land of Canaan, like Benny in Michigan, and like Ronnie in Ireland, our places have been written into our stories.
Acts 17 tells us that the Lord of heaven and earth has determined allotted periods and the boundaries of the dwelling place of everyone that lives on the face of the earth. Just as he sketched the boundary lines around Judah’s inheritance — around every hill and stream and valley — he has determined the boundary lines of our dwelling places. The God who made the earth and everything in it has determined the place for each created being.
This means that the place you live is not coincidental. Your neighborhood, your workplace, your school, your church, your grocery store, your local park — all of it is written into your story by the divine Author, for your good. But that alone is too small a thing for this Author! Even more, you and your place are woven into the story of all time — a story that displays the glory of the One writing it, a story that culminates in a place where he himself dwells with his people.
The hope of that culmination is what causes me to fight for a settled sense of belonging. Any belonging that I feel today, in this beloved place that I’ve called home for twenty-five years, is only a foretaste of a better belonging. I want to savor it here and whet my appetite for what is to come — when the dwelling place of God is with man. The settled sense of belonging in that place will be complete, secure, and eternal!