I’ve been watching the SAG awards and my heart is aching. I so miss my home!!

I can’t believe that after all this time I see feel that LA is home; that the Industry is still home. Many have talked tonight about feeling so grateful to be a part of the acting tribe.

I miss my tribe! I don’t have one anymore and I really miss it.

My tribe had been the assistants; everyone from PAs to writers and producer’s assistants. My tribe was all of us who worked one job while working toward and dreaming of another. My tribe was all the wanna-be-soon-to-be’s. My tribe was sometimes at Sony, sometimes at Disney, but mostly at Paramount. Oh, man, how I miss those gates!!

My tribe was also at Mosaic. People who understand what it really means to be "on mission" with Jesus. Who understand the sacrifice it takes to live this life unplugged from the Matrix. Who relate to the not only the struggles but the joys of walking with Jesus; the very personal, quirky ways of God, and who are not afraid to enter into the hard conversations, live life over the edge and give of themselves till they bleed.

I miss LA more than I can say. I miss the feel of the city, the diversity and the crazy people. And yes, even the smog and traffic. I miss driving to the studio every day, walking through the gates and eating lunch at the commissary. I miss talking writing stuff with friends and my bosses and acting jaded about the "industry" at large. Most of all I miss my tribe. My peeps. I miss the creative community, both in the Industry and at Mosaic, who challenged me every single day to make every moment count, to create beauty where ever I went and to be light to the dark world how ever I could. Oh, God, how I miss it all!!

Its not that Nashville is bad, or that my church is unfriendly. Its just that it isn’t home. Mosaic is home. LA is home. I don’t know if anything will be able to replace them in my hearts, and I am working to make the new places I find myself in homey, to make them home as much as possible. I guess it will just take more time than I thought. I really do love Nashville.

But times like tonight remind why I love the Industry so much. There is a culture and a language I understand, that is my heart language. I fall naturally into it. When the actors talk about loving the green room and make up trailer, and hanging out around the craft services table, I understand them on a heart level. When S. Epatha Merkerson won her first SAG award at the age of 54, my heart soars because I know what it means to work so hard in such a hard industry and it gives me such hope that a woman can still get awards in their fifties in such an age-biased industry.

How awesome LA is! Yes, my friends — and all who stop by — if you live in Los Angeles, revel in it. Dance in the moonlight and sing on the freeway on your traffic-ridden drive to work. Smile at the homeless waiting at corners to sell you oranges or wash your windshields and feel warm inside that some film team decided to keep the work in your part of town instead of taking their money and jobs to Canada. Yeah, the rent is too high, housing prices are ridiculous, gas is downright unaffordable and the traffic is maddening. But man, you live in the most diverse, most amazingly entertaining and delightful city in the world! Revel in your home. Nothing can compare.