Home again, home again jiggity jog.
I would like to register shock and amazement (and quite a bit of muttering) at how everything has changed, yet nothing is different.
I arrived in Atlanta after a rather exhausting day of travelling (ever noticed how boredom leads to exhaustion?). After waiting for an hour or two at the COS airport, I finally got on my plane only to find a crowd of vaguely familliar CC people seated all around me. So, of course, instead of relaxing in my relative anonymity, I had to pretend solidarity with my schoolmates and answer questions about what classes I was taking, what I was doing this summer, and had I tried Herb N' Farms new vegan wraps yet?
No, I had not. I hate vegetables, and I stereotype most vegans as pretentious nutrition-whores.
So, I feigned sleep with my headphones on--it was a pretty boring flight. No movie, no turbulence. Of course, after I got to Atlanta, got my baggage, rode MARTA all the way to the other side of the city, my parents wanted to go to dinner. It was a struggle not to faceplant into my lobster risotto, let me tell you. But when I finally got to my house--wow. What a feeling. I flopped on my bed, took in the sight of my pristine french-provincial-style room with its sweeping canopy, beautiful antique furniture [that my great great grandfather crafted!], and turned on my favorite jazz station. I forgot how nice it can be to be in my room. I delighted in looking over all of the books in my bookcase, becoming familiar with these old friends. I picked one that I had read a thousand times, curled up under the covers, and listened to the late-night thunderstorm rage outside my cozy little home.
Since Madeline is out of town for the weekend, I was stuck with my mom on Friday. Honestly, though, I didn't mind. I missed mom a lot and it was good to be around her again. My little sister is obviously too normal, because mom said she'd forgotten how goofy and downright strange people can be. She's so proper sometimes, and it's gotten worse since I've been gone. Apparently she's "active" in our neighborhood now--and while I think it's great for her (and dad too) to have friends, I was kind of hoping they would be more like her old friends, starving-artist type people, than these Stepford Wives. Oh, and I have to remember my table manners again. Damn. At least the food's better and merits that type of respect, unlike Rastall.
My parents and I are kind of at a loss for things to discuss. I find it more difficult than ever to start a conversation about something that matters to me. Their authoritarian attitude about all matters pertaining to their household has now, unfortunately, bled over into their politics and intellectual philosophies. Thus, I am labeled (perhaps not entirely inacurately) as the hippie home from college, whose philosophies and politics are but a jumble of hopelessly flawed liberal catchphrases. Ironically, since my parents find it effective to write off my words as sophomoric gibberish (I'm not bitter, really), it leaves them free to see me as somewhat less than a threat to their stability (mental and emotional, mostly), thus I have been experiencing more freedom than I have ever been party to before. Another side-effect of this phenomenon is that my parents and I get along better. We can joke about things without them worrying about me getting to "sassy" with them, and they have learned to laugh with me at my idiosyncracies rather than try to straighten me out into a "normal" person.
I would like to register shock and amazement (and quite a bit of muttering) at how everything has changed, yet nothing is different.
I arrived in Atlanta after a rather exhausting day of travelling (ever noticed how boredom leads to exhaustion?). After waiting for an hour or two at the COS airport, I finally got on my plane only to find a crowd of vaguely familliar CC people seated all around me. So, of course, instead of relaxing in my relative anonymity, I had to pretend solidarity with my schoolmates and answer questions about what classes I was taking, what I was doing this summer, and had I tried Herb N' Farms new vegan wraps yet?
No, I had not. I hate vegetables, and I stereotype most vegans as pretentious nutrition-whores.
So, I feigned sleep with my headphones on--it was a pretty boring flight. No movie, no turbulence. Of course, after I got to Atlanta, got my baggage, rode MARTA all the way to the other side of the city, my parents wanted to go to dinner. It was a struggle not to faceplant into my lobster risotto, let me tell you. But when I finally got to my house--wow. What a feeling. I flopped on my bed, took in the sight of my pristine french-provincial-style room with its sweeping canopy, beautiful antique furniture [that my great great grandfather crafted!], and turned on my favorite jazz station. I forgot how nice it can be to be in my room. I delighted in looking over all of the books in my bookcase, becoming familiar with these old friends. I picked one that I had read a thousand times, curled up under the covers, and listened to the late-night thunderstorm rage outside my cozy little home.
Since Madeline is out of town for the weekend, I was stuck with my mom on Friday. Honestly, though, I didn't mind. I missed mom a lot and it was good to be around her again. My little sister is obviously too normal, because mom said she'd forgotten how goofy and downright strange people can be. She's so proper sometimes, and it's gotten worse since I've been gone. Apparently she's "active" in our neighborhood now--and while I think it's great for her (and dad too) to have friends, I was kind of hoping they would be more like her old friends, starving-artist type people, than these Stepford Wives. Oh, and I have to remember my table manners again. Damn. At least the food's better and merits that type of respect, unlike Rastall.
My parents and I are kind of at a loss for things to discuss. I find it more difficult than ever to start a conversation about something that matters to me. Their authoritarian attitude about all matters pertaining to their household has now, unfortunately, bled over into their politics and intellectual philosophies. Thus, I am labeled (perhaps not entirely inacurately) as the hippie home from college, whose philosophies and politics are but a jumble of hopelessly flawed liberal catchphrases. Ironically, since my parents find it effective to write off my words as sophomoric gibberish (I'm not bitter, really), it leaves them free to see me as somewhat less than a threat to their stability (mental and emotional, mostly), thus I have been experiencing more freedom than I have ever been party to before. Another side-effect of this phenomenon is that my parents and I get along better. We can joke about things without them worrying about me getting to "sassy" with them, and they have learned to laugh with me at my idiosyncracies rather than try to straighten me out into a "normal" person.
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