The Diary Of A Wistful Girl

June 27, 2024

Dear Diary,

I drove back to the place I'm supposed to call home today. I was away for a few months working, but now I'm back and everything is the same.

Of course it is the same.

All of it, except for me and the wetlands behind the grocery store where a new subdivision draws the attention of city folk looking to raise children in a safer environment.

I'm sure the newly homeless wetland critters wouldn't agree to its safety, but I digress.
The landscape and I are forever changed, reflecting the time that's being carved into our skin without consent. I study the subdivisions and a scowl tips the corners of my mouth down. There's nothing special about them or the land they claim.

But when I was five there used to be a sign that said "No Swimming Alligators" nailed to a tree on the edge of the wetlands. It was visible from the road and every time my dad would drive us past it he would teasingly warn about swimming in Alligator Swamp. In hindsight, we live in the north and there are no alligators here, but I imagine many parents told their starry eyed children the same cautionary tales. It's funny how so many of our young minds were connected through the experience.

And did we even know? I don't remember talking about it with anyone, but I'm certain the unspoken experience still affixes us.

The tree is gone now along with the sign, replaced by a framed back deck of cheap, dented metal.

I can't help but feel like how it looks after all these years.

Returning has me feeling the same way you feel when you come home from university for the first time, but somehow darker - deeper. You're blindsided by the discomfort of knowing that you are changed, but the air remains the same even if the wetlands are now a combination of fresh sod and beige siding.

I cannot stop running from and returning to this place even though every time I come back I feel as though I've outgrown these streets a little more.

The ones I raced my bicycle down on hot summer days.

The ones my dad taught me how to drive the family van on.

The ones I followed to guide me away from here in the first place.

These streets were a puzzle, a hedge maze I sometimes wish I didn't sprint through, reaching all the checkpoints as swiftly as I could. If I'd known about this feeling of returning, like losing yourself and learning yourself all at once, maybe I would've revelled in the ignorance a little while longer.

It is gut wrenching, after all, simultaneously feeling like you're falling and flying.
I wonder if it will ever go away? I haven't decided if I want it to.