Greentext

> be me
> go home because parents guilted me into it
> first step out the airport. It's 1000000° and the air is sticky asf
> IveMadeAHugeMistake.jpg
> house is a wreck. random bullshit piled to the ceiling in spare rooms just like when I was a kid
> mom bitching about brown people. same bitching I've heard all my life
> dad talking about how he's gonna retire soon. yeah right. what would he do with his time if he wasnt working?
> feel melancholy and hopelessness setting in
> tfw you realize you have to live like this for 2 more days until your flight

I got no place to go back too. I don't have anyone waiting for me anywhere.

I'm a bit older than this and I've been feeling this too. Getting older is weird.

who knew our version of poetry starts with 'be me'

You can never really go home.

Fuck.

After both parents died, we four kids sold the house. It's still "home", but it's not ours anymore. That home exists only in our memories, as do our parents. At 60, I'm the youngest of the four of us, so they'll all be dying sooner than later. I take better care of myself than any of them, so I'll probably be the last to go. Then it will only be my son left. He's adamant that he doesn't want kids, and I fully understand. Our family name will die with him.

That's life.

I've kind of been on both sides of this.

For me, returning to and then leaving my home town triggers feelings of melancholy but also relief. I didn't grow up in a stable, solidly middle-class (or higher) lifestyle, so I'm sure that's a factor.

While I had a good childhood and loving parents, things got complicated the older I became. And even when I happen upon a reminder of the good times or a fond memory, way too often it's tainted by how fucked up things were at the time.

On the other hand, "the kids" ... it's wonderful when they're home for summer. When they're at my house, at least I know they are safe, happy, and that all their needs are being met, in as much as possible. It's sad to see them go, when I know it's going to be months before they're back.

But also, it's a sigh of relief when my life can go back to being on my terms sans drama and chaos. It's almost total bliss when I can go out to the kitchen in my undies for a cup of coffee fully confident that the milk jug won't be sitting in the fridge completely empty (or with a minuscule amount of milk remaining so as to be practically useless but also technically not empty).

Expected this to take a dark turn because anon, was not prepared for warm poetic nostalgia in its place.

>be me

>have been avoiding my parents' house for over a decade

I yearn for the time when I was a kid. I yearn for the time when the right side of my body functioned almost as good as the left. I yearn to be picked up by my dad, to sneak chocolate chips out of the baking cupboard instead of just buying the damn things from the store. I yearn for my birthday to be an event with gifts and a day I’d anticipate two weeks in advance, instead of remembering I missed it again the following morning, after having spent my birthday at work. I yearn for summers off and I yearn for fifty dollars to be a lot of money with no responsibility.

I yearn for time.

Wholesome.

I still yearn for the past some days. Days when I would see friends everyday. Days when I didn't have to worry about bills. Days when things were simpler and easy. But, I realize that my life isn't as bad as I thought. Parents rarely fight now. We have money and I'm, for the first time, financially stable. And, I still have a good relationship with my parents. When I visit them, I still go back to when I was a kid. Mom and dad would make my favorite food, I now have access to all my favorite cartoons from when I was a kid thanks to streaming. The big difference is now I can actually help them financially and physically as opposed when I was a scrawny, poor shrimp. I sometimes miss those days, but I'm making the best of what I have now

I'm still young at 25, but I can see the hallmarks of aging. I've moved to a new state for 5 years now and when I visited my old home it felt half foreign, half familiar. I'm the youngest so my mom's age is starting to show.

Things I consider recent are now described as "years ago". I'm seeing things evolve through life. Things that felt like they had a beginning, middle, end now are starting up again. Almost like a ride that's resetting for the next ones in line.

In the words of NK Jemisen:

"Home is what you take with you, not what you leave behind."

I wish I had that nostalgia for my hometown. Approaching it just fills me with dread. I hate so much about that place. It reminds me of isolation

Was in a car with some coworkers and I realized I'm now the oldest one in the car.

It's nice seeing my parents but everything else in my hometown is depressing.

The things that have changed are depressing because they represent lost youth. But, the things that stayed the same are also depressing, because it means the same bunch of people just spent 30 years on a treadmill and got nowhere.

Must be nice to have had a childhood that evokes that vibe.

I’m in the second half of my 30s now. I own the house I grew up in, it’s in bad shape, actually about to have it renovated it now. I live and work in a different country for a few years now, making a lot of money, but I dearly miss home. The street, the trees, all the memories of my childhood. It’s in the nice suburbs of an Eastern EU capital, so it has developed/gentrified well, with modern services and stores not far. My father is dead, my mother lives 3 streets from this house, which is also great.

Wife and I are actually considering moving back in a few years, after the renovation is finished. Some things feel priceless - to think we could raise a family in the same house in the same neighbourhood, have our children ride their bike under the same trees, next to the same small stream. None of this would of course be worth it, if we couldn’t make a living there, so we are in a lucky situation, and I understand many are not.

Still, I wonder if this is just some nostalgia for easier times, and if it makes sense to “throw away” a safe life in Western EU that many from this country would kill for, chasing a feeling like this. On the other hand, I think people spend their whole life trying to feel loved, successful and happy, so what else is really there? We can have all the rational components like health, safety and money in place, yet still feel unfulfilled inside.

If we are lucky to live to an old age, we’ll look back on our life to search for meaning and reflect on our choices, what will make the biggest difference? I honestly don’t know

that stability is incredible. i've never really had it. i moved out at 15, after my parents' divorce, and by the time i was done with uni i'd moved 12 times. at that point nobody in the extended family had their original living spaces left, if they were even still alive.

Damn onion ninjas

Kind of reminds me of this beautiful poem:

"...And I will leave. but the birds will stay, singing:

and my garden will stay, with its green tree,

and its white water well...

Many afternoons the skies will be calm and blue,

and the bells in the belfry will chime,

like they're chiming this very afternoon.

The people who have loved me will die,

and the town will burst anew every year.

And in the corner of my green, flowering whitewashed garden,

my spirit will wander nostalgic from tree to well.

And I will leave,

and I'll be lonely, without a home,

without a green tree, without a white water well,

without calm and blue skies...

And the birds will stay, singing."

-"El viaje definitivo", Juan Ramón Jiménez

I want to stay in my kitchen forever lol.

I'm fortunate to have had a great childhood full of love and community, but I don't want to be a child, you know? I don't want to go back to, like, a cocoon.

Maybe I'm reading into some of these comments, or maybe I just have a different nostalgia. Just leaving this comment for anyone else who's a bit weirded out. 👋

Fake: Anon has an idyllic homelife

Gay: Anon is emotionally well-adjusted

Yeah, I noticed in my late 20s that the world has changed from my childhood. All my childhood sports heroes have retired. New music genres have replaced what I heard on the radio. A lot of my old haunts are still there, but some have been knocked down and replaced. It's an... unsettling feeling when you realize the ground is moving beneath your feet. The best thing you can do is to keep moving yourself (figuratively, not literally). Explore new places, make new hobbies. Fill up your time with new experiences and you won't have as much of a sense of loss.

My elementary school is now a neighborhood. But I still walk down the road, and looking at the landscape, I know I stood here as a child wondering what the future might hold. It’s very strange. I feel like I have the memories of a different person.