The Road Back To Me

The Road Back To Me

Who the hell burns down their house trying to burn her ex-boyfriend's clothes?  Me, that's who.  I was just trying to do a ceremonial cleansing when a bee flew at me and I backed into the burning pit.  The pit fell onto the  deck and, well, the rest as they day is history.  Que me driving to Tuskegee, Alabama to stay with my mom while I figure out what to do next.  Thankfully I can do my job remotely so u dont have to worry about that part.  Driving the 14 hours from St. Louis to Tuskegee is exhausting and the scenery is either trees or farms for most of it.  No excitement there. After about 7 hours of driving I pulled into a gas station for a stretch, some comfort food and a fill up.  I was already in Tennessee and the attendant greets me with a southern tang in her voice and did a double take at my looks. She took in my butterscotch skin, curly hair all over my head, gray eyes, thick  pink lips and wide nose. She was, as per usual, trying and failing to figure out if I am black or a very tanned white lady.   As I answered her back I heard my southern accent creep back into my voice and I shuddered.  Where the fuck had that come from i had not heard that sound in almost 20 years.  The minute I moved to Boston from college I had worked tirelessly to make sure that my southern drawl had died a painful death never to be resurrected again.  Just being back in the south was dredging up things much better forgotten I dread, as I have been this whole drive, what will happen once I am back on Pugh Drive.   

6 hours later after speeding after the sun went down I pulled into 94 Pugh Drive.  I looked up at the small two story brick house surrounded by oak trees and crab apple trees.  There was a definite smell that was unique to this place.  Tree sap and burned leaves.  As I got out of my car several cats scurried away as I walked.  Great, my mother had acquired more cats to piss all over leaving a pungent stench in every dark corner. My childhood home is surrounded by an acker and half of green grass, trees and pine needles.  There was a garden that was sprawling and spilling over with vegetables on the side of the house that I could not see in the dark but I knew it was there.  There was no driveway or garage but instead a dirt road and empty places in the back yard to park.  I saw my mom's car as I walked up the back steps and took my key and turned the lock.

My mother was sitting at the tiny island in her tiny kitchen with a cup of what I assumed was tea waiting for me.  I know when she finally saw me through the dim night light that was the only thing illuminating the space.  Her eyes narrowed and I knew I was in the epic fuss fest that I had been waiting for since I called her and told her I needed a place to stay temporarily.  As soon as I kissed her on the cheek and sat on the wooden stool next to her she started in on me.  I was told how stupid I was to try and burn clothes on my deck.  How irresponsible I was to burn anything other than wood and why didn’t I have any water to make sure the fire didn’t get out of control.  This went on for a full thirty minutes before she dismissed me up into my old room like I was a disobedient teenageer again.  And like when I was a kid in trouble I mumbled sorry momma and walked up to my room with my head down.  I was at the top of the stairs before I remembered I was a grown ass woman and did not have to sit there for that lecture and certainly did not have to go to my room. Something about being back in this house reduces me to the perfectionist teenager who hated to disappoint my mom.  My dad passed away when I was 13 from prostate cancer so it was just me and her against the world.  

I walked down the halfway and opened the second door on the left, my old bedroom.  As I opened the door I let out a sigh.  The room was the exact same as it had been when I had left it at 18.  A princess canopy bed centered under the window on one side of the room with an oak bedside table and desk lamp on top.  On the opposite wall was an oak dresser; the walls were a sick bubblegum pink topped off with lace curtains on the windows on the two adjacent walls.  I wanted to take a sledgehammer to the whole room instead I dropped onto the pink bedspread, put my head in my hands and wondered how my life had gotten so shitty that I ended up in the one place I never wanted to be in again.   When I left at 18 I swore to myself I would never darken these doors again.  I had been making my mother visit me in every place I lived and begging her to move out of the south.  This place held nothing but bad memories for me. I had been teased relentlessly for my skin color and my perfect speech.  I had been called things like an oreo and told I talked white.  Because I actually liked school I was called the teachers pet just because I actually loved my teachers.  I was beat up because it was assumed I had straight A’s.  I worked my ass off to get into Cambridge so I could be as far away from this backwoods town as I could get.  I know the moment I stepped back into this town I would become the same scared little confused girl I had always been here.  Too light to be black, too dark to be white, too smart for her own good.