Going Not Quite Home
I am very good at keeping secrets and keeping my mouth shut in situations where I need to. My friend Merrihop was getting married, and Uriel and I were invited to attend. The ceremony was in Abeline Texas, but Uriel decided to use the trip to do something I'd been wanting to do for awhile.
I went back to Oklahoma City in early June. I know some folks that read this live there and I apologize for not mentioning this visit anywhere, but as the last thing I wanted to do was encounter family, I told maybe three or four people about my trip.
From the moment I stepped off the plane I started having flashbacks and memory jolts. They had the same stonework in the airport as they used to. We snagged our bags and rental car and I just sort of stared out the window as the memories flooded my brain.
Florida has spoiled me. We're a tourism town so we do what we can to make the state look pretty. We're also darn near tropical so if it isn't green then it will quickly become green if exposed to the outside long enough.
Oklahoma was brown. The sky was brown, the roads were brown, the buildings were brown. Some of the people we encountered looked broken and beaten down. The bad economy seems to have hit the state hard as many of the areas that I remembered being cute and quaint were broken and run down. The condo I used to live in was now in a neighborhood with “Neighborhood watch” signs everywhere, which indicated to me that there was a reason why they were watching. Also dozens of the beautiful trees that lined the place were gone and the grass was nothing but yellowed patches on bare earth. I guess they had to let the groundskeeper go.
We ate at Cattlemen's, which I had never done while I lived there, but it had a reputation of being an awesome steak joint so I ate there to say I did. It wasn't bad but... meh.
Driving by so many old houses I used to live in made my brain go into memory overdrive though. There was the window that I considered climbing out of to get away from my mother. There was the little fence a neighbor built that I accidentally bumped with my car while I was learning to drive because my mom's method of instruction was to screech in my ear. (I remember once demonstrating to her what it was like, and she whined about how I had given her a headache.)
Once place I wanted to go was a spot where I quietly muse is where I got to meet my guardian angel, or whatever force you consider to be whatever watches over young girls in trouble. There were a bunch of boys who tended to bully me and on one occasion they decided they'd had enough of me riding my bike through 'their' neighborhood. The surrounded me and the ringleader grabbed the front of my bike and slammed it down hard enough to snap off the front wheel. They were probably going to hurt me next when a car came out of nowhere and a woman I had never seen before told them to stop. It gave me time to escape. I snapped a photo of the corner where it happened just as a memory.
While driving through that neighborhood I also had a memory jolt of being in the playground of a Vietnamese church out there and sitting in a concrete tube meant for kids to play around. I'd found a monarch butterfly that was torpid from the cold and let it sit in my hands until it was warm again. I'm sure it died or was eaten by something, but for a few minutes I felt like I was helping.
There was the field where my sister was almost abducted. The pond where I'd go to feed ducks was now heavily landscaped with a sign that prominently said “Please do not feed the ducks”. I wonder if they still call it 'Pig's Pond' these days? Named after Mr. Pig, the man who took care of it. For all I know he's dead now. We passed by the duplex my mother moved into when she had freshly divorced my father, the apartment complex she worked at where she met my stepfather. We visited a place where I went to grade school for a year or so, so rebuilt and remodeled that I barely recognized it. And yet the moment I saw her apartment unit I remembered a friend we had named Tiffany. And there was the field where a bully kid had hit me in the head with a rock. There was the driveway where I watched a neighbor gut some fish he caught. There was the bush that we buried my hamster under when he died.
None of the places I used to live were ever 'nice' but they'd gotten worse. The whole state had gotten worse. I don't know if it's the economy or people leaving or just how it looks and I never noticed but it was a big ugly mess.
I'd also mentioned Eskimo Joes to Uriel, who thought it would be cool to visit so we took the drive to Stillwater which I actually liked better than Oklahoma City. It was a neat little college town with an artsy feel to it. But this is typical for college towns, really.
We also managed to get a hamburger at Big Ed's, the last one in existence. The last one I ever ate at was in Walters, Oklahoma with my stepfather (or maybe near Lawton, I can't remember). So it was an interesting memory. I learned that Ed had passed about six years ago after selling the franchise and whomever took it over apparently did not really mind after it as this was the only survivor. Still, the burger was very nice and the fries were wonderful.
Crystal's Pizza was gone, Enterprise Square was gone, Bricktown was a mess. Although the hideously ugly Mummer's Theater was still standing (although I hear it faces demolition). All in all I saw shadows of where I grew up, but I also saw rot.
Thursday night we slept in a hotel room that was clean, but the beds were made out of concrete. They did a number on both of us and we slept horribly. Eventually though we made it out the road to my second destination I wanted to visit.
I had asked Uriel to take me to where my grandmother used to live in Headrick. The little town had lost about half of its population in the span of a few years if the census was correct. A lot of the buildings were still there, but it also was not the town I remembered. Many of the houses where I would visit people as a kid were abandoned and run down. It didn't look like anyone had moved into my grandmother's house after she moved out over twenty five years ago. The general store where my sister and I would buy soda and candy was closed, although a bar had opened nearby.
I asked if we could drive through Altus where we stopped at a Braums for ice cream. I had told Uriel that the ice cream was good and although the restaurant was swarmed with flies, the ice cream was indeed good. I also passed by the United supermarket that I'm certain grandmother did most of her shopping at.
As we drove away I remarked that it didn't feel like the place I grew up in anymore. Uriel, astute as always, replied with, “You're from here, but it's not your home.”
The wedding was nice. The drive was nice. But it was also nice to get back home.
I went back to Oklahoma City in early June. I know some folks that read this live there and I apologize for not mentioning this visit anywhere, but as the last thing I wanted to do was encounter family, I told maybe three or four people about my trip.
From the moment I stepped off the plane I started having flashbacks and memory jolts. They had the same stonework in the airport as they used to. We snagged our bags and rental car and I just sort of stared out the window as the memories flooded my brain.
Florida has spoiled me. We're a tourism town so we do what we can to make the state look pretty. We're also darn near tropical so if it isn't green then it will quickly become green if exposed to the outside long enough.
Oklahoma was brown. The sky was brown, the roads were brown, the buildings were brown. Some of the people we encountered looked broken and beaten down. The bad economy seems to have hit the state hard as many of the areas that I remembered being cute and quaint were broken and run down. The condo I used to live in was now in a neighborhood with “Neighborhood watch” signs everywhere, which indicated to me that there was a reason why they were watching. Also dozens of the beautiful trees that lined the place were gone and the grass was nothing but yellowed patches on bare earth. I guess they had to let the groundskeeper go.
We ate at Cattlemen's, which I had never done while I lived there, but it had a reputation of being an awesome steak joint so I ate there to say I did. It wasn't bad but... meh.
Driving by so many old houses I used to live in made my brain go into memory overdrive though. There was the window that I considered climbing out of to get away from my mother. There was the little fence a neighbor built that I accidentally bumped with my car while I was learning to drive because my mom's method of instruction was to screech in my ear. (I remember once demonstrating to her what it was like, and she whined about how I had given her a headache.)
Once place I wanted to go was a spot where I quietly muse is where I got to meet my guardian angel, or whatever force you consider to be whatever watches over young girls in trouble. There were a bunch of boys who tended to bully me and on one occasion they decided they'd had enough of me riding my bike through 'their' neighborhood. The surrounded me and the ringleader grabbed the front of my bike and slammed it down hard enough to snap off the front wheel. They were probably going to hurt me next when a car came out of nowhere and a woman I had never seen before told them to stop. It gave me time to escape. I snapped a photo of the corner where it happened just as a memory.
While driving through that neighborhood I also had a memory jolt of being in the playground of a Vietnamese church out there and sitting in a concrete tube meant for kids to play around. I'd found a monarch butterfly that was torpid from the cold and let it sit in my hands until it was warm again. I'm sure it died or was eaten by something, but for a few minutes I felt like I was helping.
There was the field where my sister was almost abducted. The pond where I'd go to feed ducks was now heavily landscaped with a sign that prominently said “Please do not feed the ducks”. I wonder if they still call it 'Pig's Pond' these days? Named after Mr. Pig, the man who took care of it. For all I know he's dead now. We passed by the duplex my mother moved into when she had freshly divorced my father, the apartment complex she worked at where she met my stepfather. We visited a place where I went to grade school for a year or so, so rebuilt and remodeled that I barely recognized it. And yet the moment I saw her apartment unit I remembered a friend we had named Tiffany. And there was the field where a bully kid had hit me in the head with a rock. There was the driveway where I watched a neighbor gut some fish he caught. There was the bush that we buried my hamster under when he died.
None of the places I used to live were ever 'nice' but they'd gotten worse. The whole state had gotten worse. I don't know if it's the economy or people leaving or just how it looks and I never noticed but it was a big ugly mess.
I'd also mentioned Eskimo Joes to Uriel, who thought it would be cool to visit so we took the drive to Stillwater which I actually liked better than Oklahoma City. It was a neat little college town with an artsy feel to it. But this is typical for college towns, really.
We also managed to get a hamburger at Big Ed's, the last one in existence. The last one I ever ate at was in Walters, Oklahoma with my stepfather (or maybe near Lawton, I can't remember). So it was an interesting memory. I learned that Ed had passed about six years ago after selling the franchise and whomever took it over apparently did not really mind after it as this was the only survivor. Still, the burger was very nice and the fries were wonderful.
Crystal's Pizza was gone, Enterprise Square was gone, Bricktown was a mess. Although the hideously ugly Mummer's Theater was still standing (although I hear it faces demolition). All in all I saw shadows of where I grew up, but I also saw rot.
Thursday night we slept in a hotel room that was clean, but the beds were made out of concrete. They did a number on both of us and we slept horribly. Eventually though we made it out the road to my second destination I wanted to visit.
I had asked Uriel to take me to where my grandmother used to live in Headrick. The little town had lost about half of its population in the span of a few years if the census was correct. A lot of the buildings were still there, but it also was not the town I remembered. Many of the houses where I would visit people as a kid were abandoned and run down. It didn't look like anyone had moved into my grandmother's house after she moved out over twenty five years ago. The general store where my sister and I would buy soda and candy was closed, although a bar had opened nearby.
I asked if we could drive through Altus where we stopped at a Braums for ice cream. I had told Uriel that the ice cream was good and although the restaurant was swarmed with flies, the ice cream was indeed good. I also passed by the United supermarket that I'm certain grandmother did most of her shopping at.
As we drove away I remarked that it didn't feel like the place I grew up in anymore. Uriel, astute as always, replied with, “You're from here, but it's not your home.”
The wedding was nice. The drive was nice. But it was also nice to get back home.