Thomas Wolfe once wrote that you can't go home anymore. I have long thought that thought has carried more than a grain of truth. But, what if you still wanted to? Or, what if you didn't want to, but ended up there anyway?
Did you ever feel that you were simply "beside yourself"? Oh, I know that phrase generally means that we're upset to no end, but I mean literally, beside yourself ... like there was another you, a shadow you, standing next to you and looking over your shoulder? Years ago there was a dishwashing-detergent commercial that used that image to get the almost-perfect housewife to switch dishwashing liquids (thereby achieving perfection ... well, at least until the laundry-detergent commercial came on). The "real" person saw the state of her dishes; the "other" person ... well, what about that person?
I think about that other person from time to time, and lately I've been thinking about him a lot. Traveling back to where you grew up can really kick that thinking into high gear. It occurred to me that I've been away from here longer than I lived here. There's no reason to be as attached as I once was. In fact, I don't think it is possible to be that attached. Thoreau maintained that things don't change, we change; but some things change as well. Oh, it's not that they get more modern or technologically advanced, rather, like fruit they ripen, and at some point that fruit may no longer be suited for personal consumption.
No, no, the fruit's not rotten, it's not just to my taste. How much it ever was is another issue, to be sure; but as far as Mr. Thoreau is concerned, yes, my own tastes have changed.
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