when i saw the exit sign for olaf, i began orchestrating the moment. i had to. i live for that shit. i dug in the cds under the passenger seat and exalted beth for the college series, volumes i-v. dave made his glorious return on the car stereo. of course, the tears followed. i slid around campus, deeply nostalgic, repeating the mantra, they're not here, they're not here. since i returned to the states i've been dreaming about other times in my life, as if the past 3 years were the dream rather that the reality. waking after one of these dreams is the pinnacle of unsettlement. a dream challenging anything that i've become or learned since college.
yesterday i substitute taught for a middle school science classroom. while i was at school, i visited my sixth grade teacher. i visited him throughout junior high, high school and college. somehow, he has always reminded me who i am. since i've returned to the states i've been confused. i've felt helpless, childlike; a feeling characteristic of my time abroad but completely foreign to my life here. as if whoever i am was forgotten somewhere half a world away. that nothing made sense anymore and everything, even the united states, was foreign. indeciperable.
when i walked into mondays the waft of scones and coffee and goodness enveloped me. home. i always used to say that i wish i could hear english spoken as if it were not my native language. and, though that never happened, the united states became a completely foreign land. it's like a song that you haven't heard for a long time. you recognize it, smiling to yourself. and, after a verse or two, you remember the words, too.
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