I can hear my dog, India, whimpering from the pen I set up in my dining room.

I just picked her up from the vet where she had surgery to repair her cruciate ligament, which she tore several weeks ago.  I’m trying to figure out if the whimpering is from pain or merely from frustration.

Never having to wear a cone around my head, I can only imagine what it might feel like to be restricted this way.

Before I brought her home, I made sure I had fresh green beans in the house (this has become her favorite snack), and I texted updates to several friends who sent good energy for the procedure and have been asking after her.

I also stopped at Dollar Tree to buy a WELCOME BACK helium balloon.  I attached the red ribbon tied to the balloon to a section of India’s pen’s brown plastic lattice.

I am simultaneously glad to have her back home (with me) and a bit worried about the special accommodations I will be making for her care and rehabilitation over these next few weeks.

I know the balloon and its message is more for me than for her.

In 2005, I had surgery to remove my ovaries.  I had a cyst in one, suspected at the time to be benign, and followed the recommendation of my medical advisers to have both removed (a decision I might have made differently if I knew more at the time).

In preparation for my procedure, in addition to stocking my cupboards with soup (anticipating wanting to spend my post-op time quietly at home) and making transportation arrangements, I devised several rituals that I thought would help me with the healing process.

I bought a WELCOME BACK helium balloon for myself and stationed it in my living room.

I didn’t like the process of surgery at all; of being rendered unconscious so that strangers could do things inside of my body when I wasn’t aware of what they were doing.

Putting up a WELCOME BACK balloon in my home was not so much about returning from the hospital and sleeping in my own bed.  It was about my spirit returning to my body. It was about the process involved in feeling like myself again.

I wonder about how India feels about being under anesthesia.  Did she dream about chasing squirrels or gnawing on steak bones?  Did she feel that any part of her was missing for a while and regaining her sense of self was as important as getting rid of the cone she had been forced to wear around her head?

With India’s on and off whimpering serving as a background soundtrack, I began thinking about the concept of home.  Why is feeling at home so important to one’s sense of well-being?

The win-loss records of sports teams demonstrate that there’s something to having a home field advantage.  The presence of adoring fans, I suppose, makes it easier to play with your whole heart, but home..

…Is about more than geography.

…Is not just about being surrounded by the familiar or taking comfort in the proximity of people and objects that you love.

Feeling at home is about BELONGING in a core way to someone or someplace or something.

I know of people who fell in love with a place on vacation and eventually moved there or bought a second home nearby.

Perhaps, an experience of a place stirred up a memory of a past life or reinforced another type of connection, inexplicable and primal.  I know people who felt immediately at home the first time they visited the desert or fell asleep where they could hear the sound of the ocean.

I feel a strong sense of connection to my dog.  I like my home; my big bed, my hanging pot rack in the kitchen, my little deck which is only a step outside my back door.  From a chair there, I’ve spent many hours contentedly watching the comings and goings of the Brown Line train.

But the place where I live has become more of a welcoming place since I began sharing the space with India.

Without words, she knows how I feel.  I can be my best self with her – or not.

Home is where there’s total acceptance.  A sense that it’s okay to just BE.

I know India and I will have challenges in the course of her rehabbing; new territory for both of us. I only hope we can both be accepting of each other as we go through these upcoming weeks together.

Having a place or companion that encourages you to accept yourself is no small thing.