You Can't Go Home Again

So, as mentioned before, I'm in Missouri for my best friend's wedding, and the truth is, you CAN go home again, it's just never the same. Last year my parents sold my childhood home and purchased a farm in Rocheport, about ten miles from town. They bought Alpacas and my mother took up spinning their wool. They've gone back to the land and I come to their house and see the same paintings on the wall and the same dishes in the cabinets, but a wholly different lifestyle. It's wonderful to see them happy but it is a surprisingly difficult transition for me.

Being here makes me miss my childhood but understand why I could never have lived the way my parents do as an adult. We are very different people. My mother would be happy living in the remotest house in the middle of quiet, star-filled country for the rest of her existence. I need people and car noises and city streets and cement and bus fumes . . . something. I crave the city. I did as a child too. I remember road trips when I was in grade school where I would be bored in the back seat, my brother and I making "do not cross" lines with the middle seatbelt, until we would come to a metropolis and I would press my face to the window, wishing I were out in the mass of people and action and excitement. I couldn't wait until I was old enough to find my own urban niche.

Tomorrow is the beginning of wedding madness. I picked up my dress today, which isn't half bad. Tomorrow is the bachelorette party which I planned and am nervous about. I want it to go off without a hitch but parties rarely do this. I need to be better about rolling with the punches. Already I've heard that none of my friend's flowers have shown up (they were supposed to come this morning), and she and her fiance just found out that there is a three-day waiting period between getting a marriage license and getting married in Missouri, so they have to go to court on Friday at the butt-crack of dawn to get a judge to waive the three days. Logistics are a nightmare.

Tonight, however, I had my first rehearsal with the high school girls at my old dance school. I am doing a piece with them that I have titled "Midwestern Makossa." It's a classical guitar version of a Makossa, which is a rhythm/music style from Cameroon. These kids are working fast. I'm already half way through after only a two-hour rehearsal. I am so happy with them. Most of the pieces I put on the Dancearts company dancers are downers and this one is really joyous and euphoric, so it's been a wonderful change seeing these girls rise to this place in only two hours. I can't wait to see it polished and performed.

No politics in this post. I am still jet lagged and trying not to miss John, who will be here on Friday. I will say, however, that Rita is looking like a record breaker and if one more hurricane hits the gulf this season after she dies away, it will be a wonder if the gulf coast is livable at all...my heart goes out to everyone trying to stay alive down there. (and I thank my lucky stars that the coast I have chosen to inhabit rarely sees storms at all..)