Two of my favorite songs are called '500 miles.' One, very fun and upbeat, by the Proclaimers, absolutely excellent for school dances, road trips, and pub sing-alongs. The other, gorgeous and wistful, sung by Peter, Paul and Mary, is what's playing right now.
We've been slogging through a lot of change in the last 6 months. Shoot, in the last 6 days. My husband signed the contract to accept the executive directorship of a festival. I was given my 2-weeks notice on my day job (long-discussed and agreed upon, NOT a surprise). Our application for an apartment north of town was accepted. An application to lease our condo is pending. Most of this happened on Saturday, while my parents were sitting in the living room of the apartment, and I was breaking the news to them about my job, husband's job, and our move. Are you ready for change? No? ok123GO.
When I meet people on the road, they ask me where I'm from. It's easy enough to say I was born in New Orleans, because a big part of me identifies that as Home. It's where I feel the most true to myself, it's where my extended family gathers at holidays, it's where many of my childhood friends live. But it's more difficult to discern the other piece of 'where are you from?' Google maps says Boston is 1518 miles from New Orleans, so that's more than three times farther than Mary Travers was from wherever she called home. Lord, she couldn't go home this a-way, and neither can I. The more my heart pulls me toward Home, the harder my career, my husband's career, and our life together pull us away. Is it some strange twist of fate that our jobs don't really exist full-time in the place we love the most? Is it a special kind of torture that I meet lovely people along the way, who in turn go back to the place where they're from, only to be seen again when we're both far from home again? One of the hardest parts about going back to Boston after a gig is the other kind of loneliness that creeps up on me. How do you nurture new or young friendships from across three times zones, or an ocean? How do you meet and make new friends, if you're never there? Unless you happen to meet people of incredible patience, or with whom you have some deep and abiding connection - I will say, I'm lucky to have a few of them back in Boston - it slips away, or withers, until you don't even bother calling anymore, because the awkwardness is too much to cope with. This is part of the reason we're moving closer to the husband's job. If I have to go away for work, and he has to commute to work, the least we can do is come back to the same address, the same roof over our heads, the same view from the window. It's a lovely little town we're moving to, with good green space for Sammy to play, and (I hope) bicycle paths for me to explore, on my way to the Whole Foods and the commuter rail station. And we will be together. I hope it will grow into a home for us, even if it's only for a little while. I used to think 'a little while' was six months, or even a year. Now, 'a little while' feels more like four years, or five. Just long enough to get a little comfortable, but not so much that I feel like I come from that place. (Red Sox Nation, but Geaux Saints)
My birthday is next week. My parents are visiting this weekend to see the show, and they're flying back to the States on my birthday. In the last 16 years, I've spent more birthdays away from my family than not, and I've always managed to find people to celebrate with. I am determined that this year will be no different, even if I have to bake the damned cupcakes myself. This life isn't something everyone understands, shit, this life isn't always something I understand myself, but it's the one I'm living right now, and if I don't make merry, ain't nobody gonna do it for me.
Enough Mary Travers and Joni Mitchell. Back to the Proclaimers. Forza.
