On Standing Still

Weeks and weeks of visits over, I begin to settle back into my own life, and there it is, that familiar itch. Sneaking up on me from around the corners, whispering questions of Where next? and What now? Only three weeks from my next trip, my mother calls and asks me to come home sometime soon. Just for a weekend, just for a spell. How tempted I am. Distract yourself with packing and unpacking, and you can ignore completely the life you have.

My summer trip to the homeland beckons, my maybe-maybe winter trip to Oz, about which I have spent countless hours in the past few days planning, dreaming, fantasizing. I forget that I am here, that this is the life. Like a shark, I fear if I stay still too long I may asphyxiate.

The kitchen smells of broccoli soup and onions; it is all my cupboards can afford me. I sink into the scent, remembering countless summers of impoverished freedom full of vegetable soup; I remember how I loved them all. I tell my mother I won't be coming. I tell myself I love this summer, this City, this Life, and I have nothing from which I need to run.

For once, I believe myself. For once, I am entirely right.