I took a spur of the moment field trip today. I started driving in the direction of my parents house (a few states away) but I ended up turning north and found my way to the town I was born in and spent my first 9 years. Horseheads. I spent a few hours wandering around, trying to reconcile how it is on the outside with how it is on the inside. The first third of my life is clouded to the point where I'm not even sure if I can trust the life-changing-traumas and the future-shaping-events that I've built myself up from. Where does that leave me? The radio stations played the same music now as they did when I was 8 and in the car with my mom going to the grocery store. Tina Turner, Billy Joel, Police, back to back. a space shuttle had exploded. I drove on the same street I was on when that happened. I parked my car in front of my old house. I hadn't seen it since the eighties. It was brown then, it's tan now. and smaller. Same with the Zurcher's house, and that other kid, that we didn't like. There are apartments now between my neighborhood and airport. There used to only be a cornfield. Virgin fires and the first time in your life when you genuinely think you are going to die.
Then I drove up to my parents summer place, a few more hours away. They were there. So was my grandfather from Texas. Surprise. We took a boat ride and they even accomodated the vegetarian for dinner. I forgot about my second life, and my third for a while. The hills around the fingerlakes were so so green and the water was so so blue. I have turned 0.3% farther than I was aiming, but momentum is a powerful thing.
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