Next Stop: Your High School Years

Spending a long weekend at my parents' house in the suburbs must be somewhat akin to entering a different dimension. Even in spite of having to come to their rescue as they lose the bitter war of Them versus Their Computers (who are constantly out to get them, in case you were wondering.); watching them lose a missing object only to find it, and moments later lose something else; and the myriad flaws in their inherently frustrating efforts to communicate with one another.

And, of course, having to call animal control when a rabid skunk starts stumbling in circles around the front yard, only to have a stocky moustached man in uniform pull into the driveway, saunter over to the doomed creature, and shoot it with a shotgun. How very West Virginia.

All of the aforementioned quirks aside, the very notion of 'home' is something that will always be unique and cherished. To, for sporadic bursts of time throughout the year, be able to abandon every single distinction of adult life and exist peacefully in this world virtually free of obligation.

Still, isn't family the greatest obligation of all? And watching one's parents age somewhat clumsily is never easy. But it's nice to know how very needed I actually am.

And it's really nice to know that when I feel the need to slip out of the screaming New York energy and into this alternate reality, even if just for a day or two, it awaits me just an hour away.