Home for the holidays (or until I go meshugeh... whichever comes first)

Okay, being home really isn't all that bad. I get to be back in my own cozy bed with a television, DVD player and all my seasons of Friends. I know how to get basically anywhere using any of DFWs 20 something major highways. I live less than 3 minutes away from a SuperTarget and a Best Buy and a 24hour Fitness. I have a choice of 1.8 quadrillion chain restaurants at which to eat or drink or watch games or what have you. I have a steady income again. I have friends and family here that I missed. And so the story goes.

I know that I really like Texas. It's big. It's proud. It's a force to reckon with. I literally woo-hooed for joy for the first five miles driving on I-35 when I crossed the Texas state line. This is a great state and a great metroplex and I missed it. Parts of it. So don't think that I don't like the Lone Star State and all it has to offer. But I'm not gonna lie to you. I liked traveling. I liked it a lot. I had heard people say before that traveling is addictive and I now I feel as though there is something very truthful to that theory.

There is something strangely thrilling about being in a new place and not knowing what you would find around the next corner. There is something intriguing about getting to know people from all over the country and how they call Rock, Paper, Scissors either Farkeling or Rochambeau depending on which side of the Mason-Dixie line they live. There is something exhilarating about seeing mountains lakes and woods of evergreens at every turn when you've only ever seen hill country, Great Plains, and smatterings of deciduous trees. And this is just by driving 1000 miles or so up the road.

Basically, what I have begun to realize is how very little I know about the world and it's people. And I think being able to expose myself to these things by being somewhere different is one way to learn and also a way for me to keep my sanity. I get really wrapped up in myself and my own way of thinking. Being able to talk to people who have never lived in the south and who grew up in a hippie commune somewhere out on the west coast and knowing that there are things that we have in common that are as apparent as our differences helps me clarify things. The feelings are the same. The thought processes are the same. The problems are all basically the same. But their perspectives are different. Their priorities are different. Their way of living is just different. And that's such a good thing. It helps open my mind in a way that my family, DFW, and Baylor University never could.

So I'm home for now. Processing where I've been and what I've seen and whom I've met. I’m fine with being in my own room, watching Friends (whom I really actually missed), going to work five days a week and having a routine once again. And I like it for what it is. It's comfortable. But there is so much for me to see and do that is elsewhere. I don't think I'll be able to stand still for long.