Where are you from?

Home is where your heart is

 or 

where you hang you hat

 or

 where you put you boots at the end of the day...

 depending on who you ask. 

For me, home is a complicated concept...
I was born in IL and have lived in 35 other places in my life.  I do not have a hometown and I don't have to worry about homecoming, or any typical traditions.
My traditions are pretty simple and require no stuff. If something breaks in a move, the tradition will not be destroyed because an item broke. Church on Christmas Eve with candle light, Epiphany for opening presents, and July 4th is a day of movies and popcorn with skittles.  Those are the big three, anything else can be considered or discussed when needed,

If you have a place(physical location) that you call home, I suggest that you be thankful for your deep roots, for the traditions of the town, for the community that has known you all of your life, for the people who have invested their lives into you.

If you are like me.. Enjoy the time you are planted somewhere, for someday it will be time to move again. To set down new roots and make new traditions.Enjoy the people you know and love for as long as you have them, for when its time to move on, its time to develop new relationships with new people in your new community, but you never forget the people and places you leave behind.

So where am I from? Here, for now.

A semi true story

It was a typical day in mid summer

The temperature was easily 95 *F (35*C) outside with at 80% humidity. The TV kept blaring about a heat advisory. "Do Not go out unless it is critical" the voice continuously states, and then when you glance at the tv, the captions cover the banner with the vital information. Just an annoying accessibility flaw within the system.

Violet sits at the long oak dining room table with her charcoal in one hand and a wadded up piece of paper in the other, to shade in the areas where only a little bit of darkness is needed.Todays' goal is a portrait of her father when he was a young man. The photos do not do him justice to what she remembers and above all she wants to capture the spirit of her dad in a drawing. He was an adventurer, a mechanic, a terrible test taker, and a wonderful dad, but the pictures that she had felt flat like it was impossible to capture all of that in one shot.She was working to ignore the hum in her ears.Its too hot to go outside, swimming is no longer an option and all of her friends have moved away just like any other summer with a military family.

 The hum isn't the fly that is banging against the screen in the window, its not the tv, and its not another person in the room as she is just at home by herself.

No, unfortunately that hum and other sounds are always in her head, you see she has tinnitus. People think that when you have tinnitus its just a hum, but her type has many other sounds that only she can hear.Sometimes its like a whistle of a tea kettle, sometimes its a beeping sound. Other days, like today its just a high pitched hum and there is no way to really block it out, but she tries to focus on what she is doing. One of the joys of being a late deafened adult. It is immensely difficult to focus some days, and today is shaping into a dozy.

"Maybe today would be a good day to go to the library, people don't expect me to talk to them there", she mused as she cleaned off the table and washed her hands at the white farm sink. The water and soap mixed together to form a greyish water that reminded her of the winter days of her childhood.

 "Now, where did I put my keys and my cane?" Normally she remembered to put the keys in the basket next to the door, but when she had gotten home yesterday, the phone had been ringing and while it was a massive challenge to talk on the phone, she was expecting a phone call from her daughter. "O well, guess I will have to retrace my steps, now where to start?" after a brief search in the house she found them in the cupboard with a can of tomato soup.

"Now, where is my cane?" you see in addition to losing her hearing quickly, she had also had some damage to a nerve in her cranium that affected her balance. She rapidly decided that if she was going to need to walk with a cane that it should be fabulous. "Oh! I remember, I left it in the car, I can see it from the window, after all, it is Pink"

 Just then the phone flashed the number on the phone display was her husbands. He normally texted so it was a surprise that he was calling in the middle of the day. His job required him to work very odd hours.They had been married over 28 years though, so they made it work. The sudden hearing loss took time to come to terms with, and some days were easier than others.  "Hello?" " Hi Honey, I am going to be off work early, do you want me to bring anything home for dinner?", "nope, its all in the slow cooker, we are having cola pot roast and salad, well actually, if you want to pick up dessert, that would be marvelous." " Can do, Love you, see you later." Click.

To be continued. (maybe)

A strange request story

The 1st prompt in the book my friend handed me said :
Write a strange request at a piano bar. I had to include 10 words of their choosing. So here is what I have so far. I may even lengthen it at some point in time.

It was supposed be a normal day day in the year 2052.There was a strange feeling in the air, the scientists were puzzled, nothing was supposed to happen, yet when they all awoke early in the morning to check all their measurements, there was the beginning of an eclipse.

On July 4th, 2052, The eclipse was not expected, it wasn't in any of the forecasted scientific journals. There had not been any celebrations of the 4th of July in over 30 years, many had no memory of why that date was important in history at one point. To the amazement of many people when they open the doors of their homes to head to work; there was a carnival in the park, the smell of caramel apples, popcorn and funnel cake filled the air. It called them to the fair, and many decided work was not vital that day. The air was filled with a cacophony of noises, the gears, the rides, the peoples screams and the whirl and twirl of people walking on the midway. It was idyllic, noting could possibly go wrong it seemed. But looks can be deceiving.

 One older couple walking hand in hand down the midway took their time enjoying the sounds of juveniles and adults alike having fun. It had been a long 25 years and they felt that it was their time to just enjoy life.They had fought hard to have the right to live in a world that was very different from when they were growing up, the war was not easy and had damaged everyone in some way. As they walked past the smells and sounds of the carnival, the men yelling "get your popcorn!" they spotted to the right of the midway an old piano bar.

The couple stopped together in shock, you see; the piano bar had been burned to the ground 25 years earlier in a controversial fashion. But there it was, right off the midway and the chalkboard sign in front said they were open. The two looked at each other and simply nodded, they were going to go see how it had been rebuilt. As they walked over they noticed some disconcerting details, the door was the same one from when they were dating; heavy oxidized copper with an oak core. The smell of cigars as the door opened, and the same music from the night before the bar was destroyed.

The biggest shock came when the bartender turned around, "what will it be folks?" as he suddenly turned sheet white... He shook his head," you shouldn't be here. What do you want?" The couple glanced at each other," just a sassafras, please." The bartender looked teary eyed,"no one has been in to visit in weeks, but your faces look familiar.."  "Ummm, this place has been gone for 25 years? No one had been in because it just re-appeared." The bartender gave a shudder. "What year is this? You are playing a joke on me. right? Tired bartender can't take a day off?"

 The couple pulled out their phones, see the date is right on the front of the phone, its really July 4th 2052." No, that means .. What does that mean? Am I a ghost? I was supposed to stop it. I remember falling and spraining my ankle and breaking my wrist. I was supposed to be the hero that no one knows.Well I guess I failed, and since the two of you are the first to walk in, you get to become the heroes of this next generation. You get to save them and prevent a war unlike any you have seen before. This is my wish for this place, that someday you can pass on the music, the fun and the freedom to live without fear. But for now, as he reached out to shake their hands, "You two are IT".

The couple glanced at each other in the bright light.. Where did it go? Where was the carnival? Where was the piano bar? And most importantly, what are they supposed to do?

Until next time