"I see my ancestral landscape. Perhaps to know so familiar a place better it must become strange again."
But it never fails that when we go home I feel at once like we've never left and that everything has become foreign. It's not a bad feeling actually. In many ways I like it. To carve a sizable space for nostalgia while away and quench it every year or so. To fantasize about pork products and Target only to be confronted with the reality that it's just bacon and another place to buy stuff. To pack in a whole year of late nights and dinners out and breezy balcony talks before returning exhausted. Admittedly, we forgot the bit about "Rest & Relaxation" this year on our trip home. I imagine we'll get better at it over the years.
There's a strange kind of loneliness to go back to everyone and everything you used to know, away from the community you've worked so hard to become a part of in your host country. There is an equally strange kind of loneliness to come back to post - which life was I taking a break from again? It's whiplash. Am I Brooke of the 2 AM Wendy's drive-through ordering or Brooke of the Omani fort exploring? If you can weather the gear shifting, it's pretty awesome to be both.
The Anthropology of Turquoise: Reflections on Desert, Sea, Stone, and Sky: Ellen Meloy
It was a great American summer. Well, it was a great American 3 weeks. We ate hotdogs and corn, went fishing and night swimming, barbequed, met up with family, jammed with friends.
But it never fails that when we go home I feel at once like we've never left and that everything has become foreign. It's not a bad feeling actually. In many ways I like it. To carve a sizable space for nostalgia while away and quench it every year or so. To fantasize about pork products and Target only to be confronted with the reality that it's just bacon and another place to buy stuff. To pack in a whole year of late nights and dinners out and breezy balcony talks before returning exhausted. Admittedly, we forgot the bit about "Rest & Relaxation" this year on our trip home. I imagine we'll get better at it over the years.
There's a strange kind of loneliness to go back to everyone and everything you used to know, away from the community you've worked so hard to become a part of in your host country. There is an equally strange kind of loneliness to come back to post - which life was I taking a break from again? It's whiplash. Am I Brooke of the 2 AM Wendy's drive-through ordering or Brooke of the Omani fort exploring? If you can weather the gear shifting, it's pretty awesome to be both.
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