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Ithaca Calling?

Thanksgiving in a little town called Accord. Turkey, dressing (two kinds), all the other fixings and lots of wine. A nice snooze and then a bus ride to Ithaca. Lamb, chicken, delicious bean soup, pork chops, salmon, trout, cassoulet and other delicacies danced on my tongue over the two plus weeks.  Delicious dips and cheeses and once again lots of delicious wines.

So now it's time to return.  A little piece of me dies when I return home.  I'm not content there.  Happy to see friends, of course.  Can't wait to hug some tightly and wish them holiday cheer.  Glasses will clink together in celebration of health and happiness and there will be laughs, lots of laughs.  It is where I live and where I have lived for 28 years.  It no longer gives me any satisfaction to say so.  Unlike my neighbors, the town's changes aren't what bothers me.  It's the bitterness that surrounds me.  The sound of the train I had trained myself to ignore has been replaced by slamming doors, loud people and car horns and sirens.  To listen to this town you'd think it was the crime and accident capital of the world.  It is constant noise and maybe it's my age, but solitude deserves silence.  My thoughts are constantly interrupted by minuscule noises, getting louder by the day.  A socket doesn't work. A hole left unfixed in my ceiling. A neighbor who finds it necessary to converse right outside my door as the early sun hits my blinds.

Ithaca is silent.  The snow muffles the already quiet town.  So much so that I awoke the other night and could have swore I heard the snow hitting the ground.  I looked out to an amber sky, light dusting on a rail that fences in the deck that we enjoy each summer. The porch sits unused, resting from the summer of activity.  I miss it so, especially during the cold mornings. I drink coffee, steaming hot, but only for a few seconds, while the winter chill evaporates into it's steam.  Sleep comes easier, meals taste better and conversations need no raised voices and no explanation. 

I find comfort in getting older and not needing to cling to something as phony as a town.  Roots are wonderful, but roots are who you are, never where you are.  My town confuses this and believes the place they stay is the reason they stay.  It's fear.  A fear I know, but need but one thing to overcome.  The root of all evil will cure my fear, but will it be enough?  Is Ithaca calling?  Not necessarily.  Maybe Wolfeboro, Andes, Portsmouth or Alna.  Some place where I knew only joy.  I need that again.  Laying one's head down in a place that brings pain is not healthy.  Eastchester has become a jail sentence.  Those who have left and some who still live there refer to it as the bubble.  There are no secrets, but the lies are plenty. I need a new start. I've joked about into the wild, but trust me, I'm not THAT pretentious.  I just want to wake in a place, with the sound of nothing that nature didn't create and call it home. 2014 might be the year.

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