It had been 10 days, 8 of those on a boat. I missed them terribly. I could feel the ache for them inside my chest. Every still moment filled with a shaking foot, a bopping knee or a compulsive time-check. When are they letting us off this boat?

We filed out into one of the 4 main lobbies of the cruise ship gathered with hundreds of other people and their luggage. We’d all been on this ship for over a week with less than 36 hours total time allotted at ports to step on land. Everybody was ready to go.

I couldn’t stop thinking about my dogs. I missed them so much. Jubilee, Lola, and Gracie. I could see their puppy dog eyes looking up at me, their butts wagging back and forth with excitement. All of them were well into adulthood and even senior ages but still had so much youthful exuberance.

“This is the last time we’ll leave you, baby, I promise,” I had whispered into Jubilee’s ear days before we left. I’d spent weeks leading up to the trip priming her for our absence. She had figured it out on her own when we brought our suitcases out of storage. Our preparedness caused her so much anxiety we had to move the packed suitcases back downstairs and out of sight.

“There are people down there moving. I’m gonna go check it out.” My wife handed me her bag and assigned me guard duty of our luggage. She headed down toward the aft of the ship and into a sea of people and rolling suitcases. A few moments later I saw her hand and half her arm waving me toward her. I struggled to half drag and half roll our stacked suitcases to her where she relieved me of hers and we swiftly joined a moving line of people off the boat. I leaned over to my wife and said for the hundredth time “I can’t wait to see them.”

We arrived at the Seattle airport with plenty of time to grab a full meal and a coffee to keep us fueled. As natives of Atlanta, we’re always surprised at other airports. Not many, even other international airports, compare in size and business to Atlanta, where it’s custom to arrive 2 hours before your flight and still end up rushing to your gate to make your seat call. Once again our preparedness was causing a wave of anxiety. This time in me. With all of the idol time waiting for our plane to arrive and take us home, all I could do was watch each second tick away slowly, seeming like an eternity.

“Now boarding group C. Now boarding all passengers in Group C,” we heard above over the intercom. “Finally,” I breathed. It had been 4 hours since we were there waiting in that crowded cruise ship lobby. And felt like an entire day.

Five and a half hours later, we landed in Atlanta. In moments we would begin our trek from the plane to our off-site airport parking lot. We just had to get through this crowd of people in this narrow airplane aisle, through half the airport and onto the train to take us to baggage claim, claim our luggage, and shuttle to our parked car. This was the final stretch.

We live in a dog’s paradise. 2 private acres with a flowing creek. Our house is on a secluded dirt road, about 3/4 of a mile from the beginning to our driveway. This, this was the longest part of the travel back to our dogs. I was watching them on our in home camera as we were making the 45 minute drive from the airport to our house. At this time, the sitter had already been gone for a few hours. I watched them laying in their respective spots, bed, couch, crate, as I road in the passenger seat, my wife driving. When our tires left the paved road and touched the dirt on our secluded road, I could see 3 pairs of ears perk up on the camera. My entire body started to sweat and I clenched my teeth. I was aching with excitement to give them the assurance that we were back and hadn’t abandoned them. To give them back their stable routine. To be comforted by them. The 3/4 mile stretch of that drive, after 10 hours of travel and 10 days away from them felt like an eternity. Until we pulled down our gravel driveway, threw the car in park, and with the engine still running, bounded up the porch and into the front door to finally be reunited with slobbery kisses and doggy tackles.