I didn’t grow up with The Lord of the Rings—Star Wars, yes, but The Lord of the Rings? Not so much.

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When the first movie came out, I remember my youth pastor and a lot of other people I knew raving about how good it was. Little did I know just how much those movies would come to mean to me.

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My brother and I watched them all. We saw The Return of the King in theatres (Mom was a trooper through that one), and we watched the extended edition of The Two Towers more times than I can probably count.

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I had many of the monologues memorized, and at night I would often imagine that I was part of the Fellowship until I eventually fell asleep.

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The movies became a place of comfort for me.

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When I had my headaches during high school, I remember watching The Fellowship one day and bursting into tears when Gandalf the Grey fell while fighting the Balrog. Even though I knew it was coming, I still felt the weight of it.

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When my ex-husband was gone, I often slept on the couch with one of the movies playing in the background, eventually falling asleep to it—just like I used to when I would play the movies in my mind as a kid.

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The monologues are still memorized. I would still choose Aragorn over Legolas. And I would still do whatever I could to insert myself into an adventure like theirs.

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But as I’ve grown and continued becoming the woman I want to be, I’ve started working more intentionally toward creating my own Shire—a place of peace that I can return to when I’ve wandered far from home.

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In November, I got my Hobbit door tattoo. While it represents myself, my mom, my dad, and my brother, it’s also a reminder that a home filled with peace can—and does—exist for me.

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For the last five years, I’ve been able to create a place like that with my parents. And in two months, I’ll get to start creating it with Aidan as we begin our next adventure.

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(Love, I already appreciate your openness to the possibility that a sword and/or bow might somehow make its way into our house over the next year.)

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So go on an adventure. Live. Leave the Shire.

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But always know that it will be there when you come home.