HOMETOWN

Every year I realize that my hometown of Mendota, Il. sucks and I cannot handle visiting my parents for more than a few days to a week, but every year my memory slips into forgetfulness and I end up scheduling a visit for two weeks because I want to be there, see them, help them and see my friends.  Each year we get along for a few days then the bickering over politics or religion begins, we get on each other's nerves, push each other's buttons (as families seem the best at doing), get bored stiff, frustrated with each other's hearing problems, and get fed up with the area's slothful politics and lack of passion and spice for life and/or food.

I always look forward to coming home, the excitement escalates unitl I walk into the depressing, stale air of  a small, rural mid-western town.  My parents and I yell back and forth to each other answering each other's questions because we are all deaf and this lasts for a few days.  After awhile, we have said all there is to say, or feel like no one cares or is listening.  Then the reality sets in and the novelty wears off like an old, crusted, dirty, worn-out sock that has been worn for far too long while traveling and the much-needed day at the laundromat is days away or the day the train or plane departs is a few days off.

The only respite I have is when I visit friends, or take my parent's lovely dog, "Cheyenne" (an 11 year old Norwegian Elkhound) for a walk, or when they go on errands and I have a moment of solitude.  Now don't get me wrong, I absolutely love my parents and am extremely grateful for them and even feel an affinity for my hometown, but catching up with friends and they tell me of old acquantances and high school classmates that are now baby-making factories or others who are locked in a bottle of booze and drowning in despair or even other ones who I once knew who have completely given up hope in life and all they do is find solace in a needle and shoot up heroine.

I find it ironic, that there has been an influx of heroine in the mid-west since the U.S has occupied the Middle East, estpecially Afghanistan and maybe even Iraq.  I know this is something people don't want to admit that we have become the largest street gang and the biggest bully on the block who runs the drug trade.  Booze, pills, cocaine, heroine, television and especially Fox news or should I say "Faux News Network".  When what we really need is honest, brave and courageous journalism and not corporate puppets, actors/actresses and comedians who just happen to be good looking, drawing the attention of millions.

Even while I am here I try to go under the radar visting a few friends, hanging out with my parents and researching this upcoming trip (which I leave on Tuesday Dec. 6th), but I have to admit that while I am here I feel the urge to drink, but I don't, at least not excessively.  I will save that for hanging out with my brother Daniel in Chicago or for when I am in the city of Buenos Aires (the city that never sleeps).

Also I noticed while sitting in the audiologists office the other day waiting to get fitted for a hearing aid.  My father asked me, "If I ever text?

 I responded by saying, "I do occasionally, but try not to make a habit of it."  It can be convenient once-in-a-while, though.

I said this to him as we watched a couple who had a child together and they were sitting across the waiting room from each other, while their child ran back and forth in between them.  We noticed they were texting each other and not communicating because they could not stand talking to each other.  They were getting pissed off at each other through their texts.  One "Agh!" after another and rolling their eyes at each other without looking at each other.  One would text the other one ten feet away, then the other would text back moments later.   Their patience was slim.  What is this breakdown of community and family so apparent in our country, when we have everything?  Is it the devisive and polarizing politics that we have allowed to sweep our nation?  It will be interesting to see a country that is considered third-world in the eyes of a first-world country and see how much more their community is vibrant and celebratory compared to the richest nation on earth (the richest, but perhaps the most depressed and least happiest).  These are honest to god questions that one must ask themself if they really love our country and what kind of a future we want.

(Not that a writer should ever apologize, but this blog is not a slam against my hometown or my parents or family or country, but for those that take offence at this I appologize, unappolegetically.  This is an attempt at being somewhat facetious with playful-like humor at a somewhat serious subject; the degradation of family and community through the lack of communication).