Oh the sweet irony

We left our honey in Port Moody.

So what? You say.

Our beautiful, liquid gold, wildflower, from a local orchard honey.

Ya, so?

I have been consuming this honey since my teen years. My parents first purchased it in 2 litre ice cream buckets. Then started getting it in gallon pails once we realized we were addicted to it. One year my dad came home with a 5 gallon pail! There is no other honey that I have tried that tastes like it. Not unlike wines, honey is affected by the environment it is produced in. I have had orange blossom honey from Atlanta, Georgia. Apple blossom honey from Abbotsford, BC. I have had clover honey and buckwheat honey and honey from a restaurant packet and honey from a tub in a common grocery store and let me tell you they all taste extremely different. But none are like my wildflower honey from Stuber's farm in Abbotsford. In the haste of the pack up and go for Brad and Carlon on their road trip adventure up north the honey bucket got left behind at my sister's.

Don't worry, the irony is not lost on me

The sweetness and unique-in-it's-make-up quality of honey can be so easily equated to our families can it not?
I love my family. Yes sometimes they drive me nuts but I still love them and currently am having a hard time releasing myself from the viscosity of the adhesiveness of my family. In other words I'm homesick. I've left my family..... my honey behind.

Hawk has found at least one honey producer up here and we'll give it a try. And I know there are lots of opportunities for more "families" for our little family. But it will be different. It's all so different.
My biscuits will taste different, my tea, my granola, my bread. All the things I use my honey for. And so my comfort level is affected, the ease, the warm blanket of familiarity and protection that comes with a family. With my family. Walking into my sister's house, kicking off our shoes, the boys running around chasing the dog, or running outside to jump on the trampoline. Hearing my niece (just barely) in her room playing her guitar, watching my other niece jumping with her cousins. Sitting in comfortable quietness with my big brother (in law) watching the hockey game, or whatever. Calling my other sister and chatting so quickly from the deepness of our hearts and knowing that even though we were separated by a 40 minute drive it would be nothing to make it happen. Jumping in the car to go to my parents to raid their garden and they want me to do it. My last drive through my old neighbourhood produced bittersweet tears. I broke my leg there, I rode my bike there, I sled down that hill, I got bit by a dog there, and all these houses for halloween.
It all went down so smooth and tasted so sweet.

So, now what. I have to leave that honey behind. I have to "set them aside" (words directly from my big sis's mouth as I squeezed her good-bye at the airport).

Ok, so I will taste the honey here. It won't be the same and it shouldn't be. It should be different, but it will still be sweet.