You can't go home again, Part I

You can’t go home again, so the adage goes, but you can sure as hell try. I’ve observed and experienced a sort of disconnect when someone or someplace ceases to be part of your life for a while, only to re-enter it at a later date. There’s the familiarity, but it’s not the same. Your life has moved on, their life has moved on, new friends have entered your inner-sanctum, replacing those who have left your orbit. Places change, whether it be in terms of demographics or ceasing to exist at all. Perhaps the closest example would be a child who goes off to college and returns home for a visit, only to find that their parents have turned their old bedroom into a den or worse, some sort of S&M dungeon. Sure, that’s the space you’re familiar with, it’s just not yours anymore—you’re on your own.

I’ve written before of my life living on Long Island before my family moved to Georgia (you’re going to have to look into my blog’s archives to find it). But I have yet to write about returning to Long Island for a visit after thirty years. For many years I had wanted to go back, but never did. I don’t remember what spurred me on to seriously consider going back a few years ago, perhaps it was my desire to show my daughter the places where I lived and roamed about as a kid. What I do remember was the initial idea that set my mind in motion about a visit.

My grandfather played any sport that ended with –ball at Baldwin High School on LI. In particular he excelled at playing football and baseball. He died before I was born, but I do have a scrapbook full of old newspaper clippings and other items from his playing days. He was good enough to entertain offers from the Brooklyn Dodgers and the New York Football Giants (not to be confused with the baseball team at the time). Recently my uncle sent me one of my grandfather’s varsity letters and a knit cap of blue and gold (the school’s colors), which have quickly moved into the “most cherished possessions” category as they’re the only items I know belonged to either of my paternal grandparents. After he was killed in a train crash in 1950, Baldwin High began offering an award in his name at their varsity sports banquet at the end of each school year. My aunt and uncle had both attended in the past to present the award, but in 2008 nobody from the family would be going. That’s when I decided it was my turn to do so.

By February, 2008, things were all set: I had made the flight reservations, reserved a car rental, the school knew I’d be on hand to present the award. I wasn’t sure about lodging, but my aunt was gracious enough to let my wife, daughter, and me stay at her place for our week long stay. The morning of June 12 broke early, and I do mean early. My wife had everyone up at 2:30 in the morning to be sure we got to Hartsfield-Jackson International in plenty of time for our flight, which was scheduled to leave at 8 am. Needless to say we got there with plenty of time to spare.

On an aside, if you ever fly on AirTran, be sure to check which gate your flight is departing on when you get to the airport. They’re apparently notorious for changing gate assignments at the last moment from what is listed on your reservations. Because of this, we had to haul ass from one terminal to another at practically the last minute.

My daughter was quite looking forward to the trip, especially the flight—her first. Speaking for myself, I was looking forward to being back in New York, though not necessarily thrilled with our method of travel. Flying combines some of my worst fears, those of heights and dying. My first time flying was back in 1993 traveling from Atlanta to Dallas…through a storm front. Half an hour into that flight we hit a downburst, and you could feel yourself going weightless as the plane was pushed downwards. So my experience with flying wasn’t reassuring prior to our flight to New York.

We pushed back from the gate after a not too long wait after boarding, a wait which still managed to bring protests from my ever patient daughter. The wait on the taxiway was short, too, and before we knew it we were airborne. My daughter loved watching things on the ground get smaller and smaller as we climbed to altitude. Me, not so much. I think I may have asked her to close her window for a little bit. I’m okay once were at 35,000 feet, as you can’t see any details that giveaway how high you are. The flight landed at LaGuardia a little earlier than scheduled. As we rolled down the runway, we passed the “Welcome to New York” embedded in the grass on the right hand side. I turned to my wife and quietly said, “I’m home,” and it felt good to be back and under happier circumstances. My prior visit to New York was for my grandmother’s funeral in May, 1978.

While planning our trip, I made a vow to avoid the Long Island Expressway at all costs. It seemed that every other day there was a story on Newsday’s web site (back when they didn’t charge you for their crappy content) about yet another serious accident. Not long after we got our rental car, while looking for the Northern Boulevard, I made one wrong turn and wound up, of all places, on the LIE. Crap. It wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. Sharing the roads with crappy drivers in a college town more than adequately prepared me for New York traffic. I followed the signs to Uniondale, the place where my family had lived. After stopping for lunch, we found ourselves on a road I was finally familiar with: Front Street. I knew that road would take us right to our first destination, that being California Avenue School. I hadn’t been inside the school since I walked out on the last day of class in June, 1974. It was very nice to be walking the halls again, but everything was so much SMALLER than I remembered. From there we drove over to my old neighborhood, and got to see not only our old house, but one of our neighbors who still lived next door. She didn’t recognize me at first, obviously, but once I told her I had lived next door her eyes lit up. We had a wonderful time talking and getting caught up, and my daughter enjoyed playing with her Scottish terrier, Angus.

From there we visited the park where the school I attended kindergarten once stood. It was torn down in 1972, a year after I finished there. I had heard stories that the park’s main building had pictures inside of the old school, but that wasn’t to be. The afternoon was getting away and it was time to drive to Long Island’s north shore to my aunt’s house. We passed a Modell’s along the way, and I made a mental note that we needed to stop there before we left. My aunt was waiting for us when we parked in front of her house. I hadn’t seen her in thirteen years, and, again, this time was for a happier reason. The last time I had seen her was at the end of 1995 for my father’s funeral. We unloaded our bags, and walked a block to the beach, which is different than what you’d expect. Instead of sand, the beach is covered in small but smooth rocks. The current there doesn’t bring sand to the shore as it does on the southern side of LI. I took a number of pictures on the beach as the sun began its descent to the horizon. I was also planning what I wanted to see and show my family, and where to go.

To write, perchance something coherent

The hardest part, for me at least, of keeping a blog is coming up with topics to write about. I like my privacy and would prefer to keep vast portions of myself to myself and not out there on the intertubes--though sometimes I've given thought to creating a second blog, random and anonymous, to write about my dark side. To those who have already thought it, no, this isn't my dark side.

Perhaps I could write about my job, which I actually like even if it can be a pain in the ass every now and again. Haven't done that in a while, but with a new and better boss, life is far less frustrating with even fewer topics for blogger fodder. No, I wont' write about that. Maybe I could write about the near total lack of driving skills at my daughter's school and generally in town. But I've written about that more than once on the blog, so one more entry would just be whining about something I have no control over--not without an M1A1 tank, that is. No, I won't write about that.

Maybe I could write my observations on politics, and how Karen Handel handily beat Nathan Deal in the GOP primary for governor, only to lose to him in the runoff election, and how that sends a message to women across the state that you're good enough to be secretaries (of State, of Education), but not governor. No, I won't write about that.

Quick, somebody throw me a topic! Oh, wait, I've got one! You can still offer up topics if you want to. I'll try to write something on it, even if I have to embellish things. Hey, if embellishing is good enough for the NY Times and the Washington Times, it's good enough for my blog.

Notice I just wrote on the topic of not having a topic. I'm a friggin' genius!

An Ode to U-Haul

It’s that time again. U-Haul trucks are much more prevalent on the streets of town. They’re back—roughly 32,000 students are descending on town after three months of relative quiet in town. Certainly the local merchants are glad to see the students, and their wallets, return. For us locals, we kind of get used to the lack of traffic on the roads and not having long waits at local restaurants. All of that will change this week.

The start of fall semester brings an air of anticipation as well as trepidation that the start of spring simply lacks. You have the incoming freshman beginning their university experience, for the most part unaware that the coming four years will shape their lives and careers forever. There’s also the collective attaching of everyone’s ego to the football team and the promise of the upcoming season. Plus there are all the experiences that go along with football games: tailgating, eating & drinking with friends, cheering the team on in Sanford Stadium, puking on the sidewalk post-game while a friend takes your picture on their cell phone and then immediately posts it on Facebook with the caption, “Dude! Look at who’s blowing chunks!”

For me, the start of fall semester is like hearing the whistle of an incoming artillery shell—I just duck, close my eyes, and hope for the best. There’s just so much that can go wrong to a class schedule in the weeks leading up to the beginning of the semester. Multiple classes have been scheduled for the same classroom, students have been confused because I forgot to update a room assignment in the course scheduling system, or the worst case scenario, having an instructor back out of a course—that has a full enrollment of students—just a couple of weeks before classes start. Yes, that did happen to me last year. Fortunately we were able to find a replacement instructor at the last minute and salvage the class. It will be harder to do that this year as we’re only one month into the fiscal year and already have had a 4% budget cut.

So quiet time is over for our little town. Now don’t get me wrong; students add a lot to this place, usually in a positive way, though not always. Fall leases for apartments took effect as of August 1, and the dorms open in a couple of days. If you are looking for me within the next week, I’ll either be dodging U-Haul trucks or in the corner of my office, ducking, eyes closed, hoping for the best.

Not so finished as I thought

February 2009 - that's the last time I posted an entry to my blog. At the time I had nothing more to write about, or so I thought. There's only so much mileage you can get writing about politics or the crappy drivers at my daughter's school. Add to that other distractions, in particular focusing more on digital photography and trying to become better at that hobby, and, well, the blog took a back seat. So eighteen months ago I decided to close up shop.

It wasn't until recently that I started thinking about restarting the blog, realizing that my problem wasn't a lack of topics, but I stopped making my observations about the human condition. What really changed my mind was a recent stop one evening with the family at a local Baskin Robbins. In addition to us were two other couples, a husband and wife who live locally and two friends, we were to discover later, visiting from North Carolina. The conversation at their table was dominated by the gentleman who lives locally. His voice boomed off every surface possible, so it was hard to ignore him. As we sat eating out ice cream, my wife and I would exchange occasional looks, telling each other via facial expression that we wished he would be quiet. But at the same time we were both fascinated by his conversational skills.

He truly belongs to a rapidly disappearing generation. The art of conversation is one that is falling by the wayside given the rise and popularity of social media sites. For example, I've reconnected with many old friends from childhood when I lived in New York. Exchanged a number of messages with them. But I could be a bilateral amputee and still have enough fingers to count the number of times I've actually talked to them. And that is what fascinated me about Baskin Robbins Man. In an era of electronic interpersonal connections, he's a complete anachronism. He belongs to a time now passed when men gathered at a local store to talk about news or the weather or how the crop harvest for the current growing season was looking. And that realization was not lost on me.

Conversely, you also have people who engage in conversation, but are not very good at it. I must include myself in this category, not because I don't want to talk, it's just that I enjoy my privacy which makes it hard to engage other people. Recently the family and me enjoyed an evening out for dinner at a local "family-oriented sports restaurant." Bellied up to the bar were two gentlemen enjoying a few beers and some food. They struck me as two businessmen-wanna be types who fancied themselves ladies men as they talked to the largely female waitstaff, sitting at the bar after a long day of racking up sales and responding to Equal Opportunity Office sexual harassment complaints. I really wasn't paying attention to them until one of them decided to make a hard to ignore comment to one of the waitresses. "Do you mind if I ask you something, which I don't want you to find insulting...but 92% of people with cold sores have herpes." Really, dude? Is that the direction you want the conversation to take? First, I take issue with you asking about asking a question, and just making a comment instead. Second, when I'm in a restaurant I really don't want to hear you or anyone else talking about herpes, and certainly don't want to hear the people handling my food discussing it as well. So perhaps I'll be adding this place to my "No Fly" restaurant list along with the downtown Five Guys and that creepy toothless woman who works the register. But that's another story for another time.