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September 12, 2006
1-614-SMOTHER
At first I held my breath, taken aback. Why was my friend's wife calling me long-distance? Was d'Andre okay? Yes, he was. Then why...? It was with a creeping shame that I remembered back to a time and place where it wasn't fear-inspiring for a friend's S.O. to call me. d'Pam was simply calling to chat with her friend.
Ah. Yes. Midwestern mental health. You'll have to pardon me for not recognizing it. All the insulation I use to combat the Seattle chill makes me equally impervious to warmth nowadays, I'm afraid.
A sales widow last weekend, Pam called to chat about the Ohio State/Texas game that had just concluded. I winced and held the phone in my lap, temporarily unable to listen. How, in the name of all that's holy, had that idiot d'Andre managed to snag a beautiful Ph.D who can speak enthusiastically about attacking defensive backs who are cheating up in the box? Him! How? How? I'm still fuming. And I'm still plotting to smother him in his sleep, not that such notions didn't predate Pam by a decade.
The conversation whirled and turned, touching on football and relationships and race and Christmas and that old standby of every conversation I have with someone in the 614 area code: do you ever think of moving back home? Moving, yes. Frequently. I look at real estate online every time Percy lets himself into my house. But moving back to Columbus never even flits through my mind. There's nothing to recommend Ohio, really, save the opportunity to not visit my parents' graves more regularly.
But this time, refusal was harder. Unlike with family members, the person suggesting I come home is from a place for which I actually have home-like yearnings. It felt good to hear. It hurt to decline. I'm not sure what that twinge is about, but I suspect it comes from some obscure, little-used, well-adjusted corner of my psyche.
Back to mental Siberia with ya, twinge. There's no place for you here.
posted by john at 8:02 AM • permalink