In case you ever wonder if it's physically possible to gain 4 pounds in one week, let me assure you that it is. Dear God, I don't think I had a single meal in which I walked away from the table feeling anything less than *stuffed*. By the end of my week in Hickory, I was actually tired of eating-and in serious need of some exercise that extended beyond walking around the mall for 30 minutes!
It was great to be back home in Hickory for Christmas (and the sunny, 64 degree Christmas day was a nice surprise)-getting to see Dad is always a good thing, and catching up with a few freiends was also fun. But, as I haven't actually *lived* in Hickory in almost 17 years, 'home' is a relative term; a small part of me was just as excited to return to London as I was to go to Hickory to begin with.
Don't get me wrong...The first Cherry-Lemon-Vanilla-Sundrop at Shell's BBQ is always a welcome taste (and don't get me started on the sweet tea...), but were it not for my father still living there, I don't think I'd really have a reason to go back to Hickory. On some level-partially because it's changed so much over the years-Hickory isn't 'home' any longer. Rather, it's just the place I came from.
They say, 'home is where the heart is,' and I guess it really is true. And though London does feel like home in many ways, it still doesn't completely. Neither does Hickory. I guess the closest thing to home for me is still Seattle (partially because I still own a physical 'home' there...), but since I'm not there at the moment, I wonder, does that make me homeless in some way?
Well, I'm somewhat comforted to see that you have discovered what Thomas Wolfe told us some time back, "You can't go home again." He was right, because home isn't there when you go. One of my biggest mistakes in my life was returning to my hometown from North Carolina. We both loved North Carolina, but I had had this nostalgia for the warm, genteel folks from Mississippi that I had grown up with and gone to school with. What I did not realize, somewhat stupidly, was that our entire culture in the South had changed from a society in which people seemed to compete, like the Chinese of old, to see who could be the most polite to each other, to a culture of in your face me first, aggressive types. Mississippi has been no exception in this change, and my hometown, which was a microcosm of gentility when I grew up, a town filled with educated and even uneducated, but solid, classy people, had become a sordid, squalid place filled with rednecks and "Deliverance" characters. It may not seem like it, but actually, I am now adjusting to living here once again, but I'm under no illusions that the town will change anytime soon. I'm thinking about writing a book about my experiences, and I hope to work on a tone that will make it seem more appealing and empathetic--sort of like Chaucer or Shakespeare rather than some ranting curmudgeon. Anyway, my point is that you are quite right in realizing that home is not Hickory anymore. Let's discuss this some more. Look at my photos to see both the good, the bad, and the ugly in our surroundings.
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