You Can't Go Home Again...
*Disclaimer- The author of this post is not responsible for any cheesiness in the post that follows. It's not her fault, she is in love, deal with it.
I have a few thoughts on that phrase and they are as follows....
Why do people say that? What do they mean by it? Do they mean that if you stay gone a really long time, like years or something, the place will have changed so much in one direction and you in another that it ceases to be the same place that you left and you can't get back to the way it was before? Well if so then that is as true and obvious a statement as "you're only young once." So why is it that we need to be reminded? Maybe lots of people remember with fondness, and a false sense of utopia, their old home town. Maybe they all picture sitting with their friends reading books on a lawn or daily visits to the soda shop and exploiting the local library.
This I can understand because that is what I remember most about Davidson North Carolina. Maybe part of moving back was a quest for something so long sought and so tragically lost. I still remember the pain and tears and tantrums when we were told once again that we would be packing everything up and moving, this time to a new state. Poor Georgia, we hated you so and it wasn't your fault. So maybe in some aspects it was an attempt at healing that eleven year old wound left on the heart of an eleven year old girl.
So what did the move actually teach me? Well it neither proved nor denied the truth in the statement "you can't go home again." I did reconnect with old friends and we were able to reform the bond that held us and strengthen it beyond imagination. I did for the first time feel like I was "home." I learned that I don't really have a home in the sense of a geographical place on Earth, I've moved too many times for that. What I have are people that love me, care for me and accept me.
As corny as it sounds I may not have learned whether or not you can truly go home again, but I did learn that "home is where the heart is" is about the truest statement ever painted onto wooden plaques by little old ladies in craft shows. I think maybe when we moved so quickly I left my heart in North Carolina, which would explain why crossing that state line always sent waves of joy over me. So naturally at some point in my life I had to go back and retrieve it before I could give it to somebody else. And as soon as I did that that feeling of being "home" transferred to a little apartment in the bottom floor of a dorm in Carrollton, Georgia. And I suddenly discovered I was very far from it.
So in a twist of poetic irony I found myself making the same move I did half my life ago, only this time under my own power, rejoicing at the sight of the Georgia welcome sign and the sweet sound of Norm's voice over the radio........"Welcome home."
I have a few thoughts on that phrase and they are as follows....
Why do people say that? What do they mean by it? Do they mean that if you stay gone a really long time, like years or something, the place will have changed so much in one direction and you in another that it ceases to be the same place that you left and you can't get back to the way it was before? Well if so then that is as true and obvious a statement as "you're only young once." So why is it that we need to be reminded? Maybe lots of people remember with fondness, and a false sense of utopia, their old home town. Maybe they all picture sitting with their friends reading books on a lawn or daily visits to the soda shop and exploiting the local library.
This I can understand because that is what I remember most about Davidson North Carolina. Maybe part of moving back was a quest for something so long sought and so tragically lost. I still remember the pain and tears and tantrums when we were told once again that we would be packing everything up and moving, this time to a new state. Poor Georgia, we hated you so and it wasn't your fault. So maybe in some aspects it was an attempt at healing that eleven year old wound left on the heart of an eleven year old girl.
So what did the move actually teach me? Well it neither proved nor denied the truth in the statement "you can't go home again." I did reconnect with old friends and we were able to reform the bond that held us and strengthen it beyond imagination. I did for the first time feel like I was "home." I learned that I don't really have a home in the sense of a geographical place on Earth, I've moved too many times for that. What I have are people that love me, care for me and accept me.
As corny as it sounds I may not have learned whether or not you can truly go home again, but I did learn that "home is where the heart is" is about the truest statement ever painted onto wooden plaques by little old ladies in craft shows. I think maybe when we moved so quickly I left my heart in North Carolina, which would explain why crossing that state line always sent waves of joy over me. So naturally at some point in my life I had to go back and retrieve it before I could give it to somebody else. And as soon as I did that that feeling of being "home" transferred to a little apartment in the bottom floor of a dorm in Carrollton, Georgia. And I suddenly discovered I was very far from it.
So in a twist of poetic irony I found myself making the same move I did half my life ago, only this time under my own power, rejoicing at the sight of the Georgia welcome sign and the sweet sound of Norm's voice over the radio........"Welcome home."
posted by Elizabeth | 8:03 AM
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