Friday was Red Nose Day. The English department dressed up as punks and I found myself pulling out my Flogging Molly t-shirt from high school; my last remaining piece of high school memorabilia that isn't locked up in the attic at my parents' house amongst the cobwebs and A-tracks. Looking at the pictures taken from Friday, it was as though I had jumped some time warp and had been sent back to 2003.
This weekend, the drama director from my high school died; this will be the second teacher from MHS to die in the past two months.
The very same day I ran into three couples in Notting Hill, two of whom were from Mahwah; they were in town for the week for a relatives wedding. Not only did they come from Mahwah, but one of the couples lived two streets down from Beverdige Road--our first house in Mahwah before my parents split. Of course, as one would who meets someone from their town 3,000 miles away, there was plenty of name dropping (to be honest the man who was wearing the Yankees hat was more interested in talking about Mahwah than answering my questions about how the Yankees were doing--I'm a bit out of touch with Baseball since it's not exactly 'popular' here), which Adam seemed to find hilarious because 'that's what Americans seem to always do...' according to him.
After all of these reminders of where I've come from, I began thinking about the past and how hard we often try to forget it.
There are very few things I remember about high school, but the one thing that I could never forget was how I felt after graduation. The graduating class was shipped off to the Sheraton Hotel for a night of dancing at Illusions followed by games at the RCC. Walking around that tacky room of lights, mirrors and blaring top chart music, I think for the first time I understood what Jaques truly meant when he said 'All the world's a stage,/And all the men and women merely players/They have their exits and their entrances'. For my 13 years spent in the Mahwah Public School System (though more specifically 7 years--6th grade was the deciding factor of whether or not I'd be miserable for a healthy portion of my adolescent and teenage life) I had been 'playing' a part, and it was finally over; saying I was relieved would be an understatement. For the first time since my mother told me I couldn't become a cheerleader (probably for the best, fitting into one of those uniforms during my final years of high school would have been beyond emotionally scaring. Not to mention I wasn't exactly coordinated...or girly...) I could relax and it felt wonderful. I went up to people, specifically those I didn't normally speak to as they mercilously teased me during school, because I didn't care any more. I figured it was better to at least attempt to leave off on good terms with people than leave with a grudge, which would require far more energy than I was willing to exhort. At that point, who cared what people thought of me? In two months I'd be 4 hours south of Mahwah, where all of this would be one hell of a bad dream.
And that's exactly what I did--five years later I'm now sat on my bedroom floor 3,000 miles from that small town with nothing but distant memories from days when I would have done anything to get out; as far as I'm concerned it's a chapter of my life that's put to rest.
Yet, during my years in college, and even now that I have a full time job, a pension, traveling the world, and an optimistic outlook about the future, I still came/come back and visit (though mainly because of my family and select few close friends). And no matter how many years have passed, I still find that there are certain people who are still residing in the same place they were 5 years ago. There are those who will never get out, and those who generally don't want to. Had you asked me 5 years ago my opinion of this I would have turned my nose up at the very idea, but if traveling has taught me one thing, it's that you must be tolerant of those who have different views than you. Originally, my view was 'what? don't like traveling? you must be out of your narrow mind!' But now, I've come to realize that there are those who don't mind that life and residing in Mahwah is enough for them to be happy. After all, don't we all deserve to be happy, regardless of how or where?
So to wrap up this post because it's clear I've begun rambling, is this: what this past weekend has taught me is that instead of trying to escape where you come from, perhaps you should just accept it, regardless of how much you may have hated it at the time. It's clear you simply cannot escape it, no matter how hard you might try. Besides, even if we did, and managed to simply forgot everything, the small quirky events in life wouldn't exist. We wouldn't have those embarrassing memorabilia pieces still stored in our dresser drawers itching to be taken out and used to your delightful embarrassment, news would never float over an ocean regardless of how serious or trivial it might be, and random occurrences, such as meeting Yankees fans from your home town, who live three streets down from your old house, in the middle of a city located 3,000 miles away from all that, would never happen.
