you are where you're from

in the sitting room of our nail-by-number house, the green carpet is reflected in the old TV. the patterned white pinwheels and pink petals spinning out are fuzzy from scrubbing up spilled wine. bouncing off the scratched 12 inch screen, the image could be mistaken for the grassy land i've been looking at all week. distorted through the sleet-hammered windshield of our van, the wet sheep with red spray paint dripping down their backs and dipping into the layers of skin under the wool. and i thought, wow, this place has really burned itself in me.

today was my last day here and it felt longer than the whole trip thus far. much of the value of time and the way it's used here has become my own. tis true of the accent as well. "the drink" will selectively left out as irrelevant in this discussion. it seems strange to think that before coming here, i was a whole person. still unaware of things i would come to identify as central parts of my own character. a certain level of patience (classified information) and my preferred pace of the day (2 steps back, 1 step forward), an affinity for spongelike decayed organic matter, and a subtle "trade" relationship with the fairy spirits for guaranteed mutual financial success.

yet, despite this last half-year lived under irish rule(s), i couldn't but take a very american approach to my last day. i spent it all alone in my van, driving all the roads i've spent all these months on learning to be best by myself. in the name of work.

while rounding rainy curves and recalling my complete disorientation on these same roads the first week or so, pieces of will-be conversations crossed my mind, distant voices asking:
"aren't they just the salt of the earth, the irish?"
"do you feel different?"
"do you feel found?"

and i can hear myself expounding upon the character of the irish, they're not what they seem, they're not what you think. and i'd choke myself if i could, but thankfully i beat myself to it by nearly running into a tired sheep, and i stop. and sitting in the middle of the road, with my blinker on, trying to have a dialogue with the fuzzball in front of me, i realize that in my own made-up conversation, i am (skillfully) avoiding the questions. that the person in question is me.

where did you go, where did you come from, who are you now, yadayada.
and that's it. maybe you can "find" yourself somewhere. maybe you come alive in a certain place. but it's always a version of five-year old you. maybe it's the five-year old that's been napping for twenty years. or maybe it's that the five-year old finally stopped drinking coca cola through his nose and fell asleep. but either way, it's not ever going to be the spiritual witness protection program, the "soul" makeover, as they say.

maybe one day i'll live in the West in a thatched-roof bungalow on Omey Island with my turf-burning stove and i will breed ponies that race on the strand. but i'll still be an american who grew up in LA, land of the lonely, learning as i go that to blend in isn't a sin. that at some point, the power windows and the stereo system don't give you space, but distance. that at some point, the sunroof becomes your ceiling, the doors your walls, and you wont just be able to hit the power lock button and climb into your shell and out of the world whenever you like. and vice versa.

and it's a remarkable thing that happens when you finally snap out of it, you park the car and walk into the pub, everybody sees because you give them time to watch you approach. they could turn on their stool, look you up and down, and make jokes to their friends about the yank that just walked in. but they don't, and they won't,
because they've already learned. everybody learns at their own pace. it's where they're from.