I took the long way to see if there was a smell. It used to be heat and pine needles and summer. I thought for sure that now there’d at least be salt and sand and water. When I opened the door there was nothing. I mean a beautiful sunset, but no smell to tie me back to this place. I for sure thought it would be like how Prell shampoo makes me think of 8th grade. But tonight, nothing
I’d like to say it’s home, but it isn’t. The Coast will always be a part of me even as little of a part I am of it. We moved here when I was 3 weeks from 7 and bought a house a block from the beach. My parents moved from the house I grew up in 1995. In 2005, that house and 60,000 others were shorn from the face of the earth by Hurricane Katrina, along with most of my history here. Buildings have returned in spaces that used to have other buildings. Some similar to their predecessors, some completely different and some remain just plots of land. I was alarmed at how tied to the physical ones history can be.
The house my parents built is nice. Sits on a lake and they love it. For me it was always a house. Not the home of my childhood. This had nothing to do with them, but just the feelings and connections we create in our minds. It’s arbitrary at best but no less real. Now this house just reminds me of my dad and I wonder how much that weighs on my mom daily now that he’s gone. Maybe it’s comforting. The view is great.
A kid from my street died this week. I mean he was 49 and so not a kid, but always that kid to me. He was one of the 8-12 of us that ran the streets we grew up in (or is it on?). I’d say he was a friend but I hadn’t seen him since high school nor spent any time with him since I was 10 so I don’t think he was. He was an only child as well but his house wasn’t where I’d want to hang out. I do remember listening to AC/DC Back In Black In his room along with BOSTON. His mom was suspicious of us Yankees who moved from Michigan here. I mean talk about the Civil War dying hard.
I guess I’m from Louisiana now, but the longer I’m there, the less I feel a part. It’s slow and wonderful in a lot of ways and slow and terrible in all the others. I’d say it’s controlled by good ole boy deals and politics as if somehow that’s any different from Topeka, Kansas or Reading, Pennsylvania or Fort Collins, Colorado. It’s a who you know world and I’m thankful and lucky to know enough to get some things done.
Like everything though, being a part isn’t all about houses or smells, or who you know. It’s about effort. In this instance you literally do get back what you put in. I could feel more at home on the Coast or in Baton Rouge or wherever if I went all in. There’d be bumps and cliques and old guards to navigate but it could be done. My dad moved to Mississippi from Michigan/Canada when he was a year younger than me and started over. The dad I knew was always more from the Coast as much as Michigan. No he wasn’t related to the real estate family who’s cousin owns the contractor company and who’s brother in law is the Mayor, but he made his mark and became a part and impacted thousands of lives.
Really. Isn’t that what making a home is?
#hugsandhi5s
