I woke this morning with these words echoing in my head: “Lackawanna High School, ball and chain.” Utter nonsense, random words that spilled from whatever meaningless dream I was falling in and out of. It occurred to me as I rolled out of bed that I was as far removed from the state of equanimity I enjoyed in Mexico as I possibly could be. My mind is filled with echoes of used car commercials and the theme to Family Guy. My body is stiff with tension and I shuffle across the bedroom floor like I’m wearing a suit of armor. I tell myself “Today I start to come back to life”, but by the time I reach the bathroom I’m thinking it again: “Lackawanna High School, ball and chain.”
What in holy hell does it mean?!?! I think it three or four more times before I finish my morning pee. When I look in the mirror I can’t help but think back to a conversation Eric and I had this past weekend while we moved my stuff from Kentucky to Carolina. We were catching up during the ride to Lexington, chatting about old friends and some of the familiar faces I’d be seeing around town now that I’m coming back to Carrboro. It’s been five years, long enough to notice how people have aged. Eric joked how so and so had lost a lot of hair, grown a gut, and now looks like “Old Bart.” My friends and I often communicate like this using Simpsons references, this one referring to an episode where Bart is shown as he might look in the future, if he became male stripper with the moniker “Bang Bang Bart.”
It was hilarious when we were talking about so and so, but this morning it wasn’t so pretty standing in front of the mirror with Bang Bang Bob looking back at me.
So I’m tired, worn down by the move and anxious about being broke and jobless. But today the dust is starting to settle. I know this because I wouldn’t be writing if it weren’t so. Soon enough I’ll be working again, and I’ll lament that I didn’t enjoy being jobless while I had the chance. Soon my wife will return from Mexico and my heart can at long last settle into its joyful rhythm.
Right now though, today, it’s finally hitting me–I’m back in Carrboro, this town that I love. There are boxes to unpack, errands to run, resumes to send out, things to remember, and things to forget.
“Lackawanna High School, ball and chain.” Maybe it meant nothing to me an hour ago, but now it’s a fucking mantra. Nothing means nothing.