The boyfriend just left a little while ago and I can't believe how sad it made me to see him leave. This must be how inmates feel on visiting day, hands pressed against the glass as the phone is hung up and your loved one raises to go, leaving you behind bars.
I'm also homesick, which is odd because for so many years I still considered this "home". But here I am, in the house I grew up in, sleeping in the same room, and yet it feels all so foreign now. They say "home is where the heart is", and right now my heart is on the 5 heading back to Bakersfield. Like it or not, Bako is home.
But here's the thing...
Since I left home over 25 years ago, I've only ever spent, maybe, two nights back here at a time, max. But now I'm closing in on spending two weeks here and I've come to a frightening conclusion...
My hometown is a lot like Bako. I mean... a LOT.
Flatten out the hills into a dusty plain, toss in a couple of cows and shellac the whole thing with a Hew Haw veneer and they're kissin' cousins.
There are the obvious similarities, like the trains rumbling and wailing in the distance. There's the undercurrent of Right Wing Bible Thump-ery, which was neatly summed up by a bumper sticker I saw in the hospital parking lot...
"Jesus Saves, Obama Spends."
I'm not even sure exactly what that means, but it left me with the mental image of Jesus stuffing a mattress with wads of cash.
There's the fog. Although it's the somewhat refreshing coastal variety and not the smothering stink-fog of the Central Valley.
There's even a Demonic Ice Cream Truck! It's been in the 80's the past couple of days and yesterday while out walking the dogs I heard the unmistakable electronic, tinny sound of "Turkey in the Straw" and when I looked up, around the corner came a clone of the scary ice cream truck that trawls our neighborhood in Bako.
And finally, there's the whole Mayberry, small townishness about it all. My mother was treated in the same hospital where my sister and I were born. I walk the dogs past my old elementary and high school. And there's the local coffee shop my father insists on eating at every single damn day. So far we've run into my old second grade teacher, my high school principal and several total strangers who claim to know me from high school.
"We were in Mr. Schultz' German class together!"
Really? I took German?
There are, of course, notable differences.
It doesn't smell here, for one. That's a huge plus right off the bat.
And the small town vibe comes off as charming and quaint because you know all the big city amenities are only 20 minutes away. Not to mention the beach. Without that, I think this place would be suffocating. Like Bakersfield.
