Friday, October 28, 2011

Nowhere Man - Initial Musings on a Vexing Question

One of the perils of meeting new people is handling the question, "where are you from?"  There is always a fifty-fifty chance that they really don't want to know where you are from, and I can pretty much assure you they aren't ready for, nor will they  appreciate "nowhere!"  For one, no one is from nowhere, and an answer of "nowhere" begs unwanted inquiry. I am never sure how to respond to this question - whatever I say feels wrong, and "nowhere" is no longer intriguing to me.
I have been thinking about being from somewhere a great deal lately. I had always supposed it was meaningful to be from somewhere, but I am not sure I ever wondered why. Does being from a place provide comfort, pride, satisfaction, or stability?  I don't know.  I sometimes say I am from Garrett (where I spent two and a half of my formative years), but feel somewhat guilty as I am not sure I earned the right to call it my hometown. At other times, I say Akron as I spent twenty years or so off and on there.  I have a house there, and I raised a family in the city - but I arrived there a grown man, it doesn't feel like I am "from" there. I guess I could as easily claim Oklahoma, Indiana, Michigan, Oregon, Jamaica, Yemen, Tanzania, and London as well, if simple occupancy qualifies as a patent of possession. 
My response of nowhere most likely comes from the realization that I don't really wish to return to any of these places just to return - I am still moving forward, maybe even away from these locations that have been very good to me.  Someone from somewhere returns, or pines to. But no one ever asks me where I want to got to, only where I am from, where I started. Perhaps I would be more easily understood if I was from somewhere, perhaps there would be a more stable core, a concomitant set of values or behaviors that would make me more predictable, more approachable.  Maybe I am afraid of where I am from - a set of ugly   circumstances rather than a geographical place that would be solid, secure, steady. Maybe by looking forward, by looking to new circumstances, I will be ready one day to stop and stay - to be worthy of a place, worthy of the legacy and virtues of a true community.
For quite awhile, I have longed to be with someone regardless of the place, regardless of the circumstances, regardless of the stability of location and home. I believed that I would be from where ever we were together, that my home, my heritage would be at the union of our two hearts, each other's arms.  That is where I would be from. That vision is no longer viable, and it is time for me to start thinking of place rather than relationship. I still don't long to be in a particular place, but now maybe to be somewhere where I can make someone else's place better, someone else's life easier - maybe I will adopt a community and it will be mine, and I will be honored with the dispensation of a location, a community that provides me with a retroactive "from."  Until then, I won't have a good answer to that pesky question, and I will have to settle for a half-hearted lie, a considerate gesture to a inane inquiry.

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