It’s All About Going Home

They say you can’t go home again.

Au contraire – living three miles from my parents – in my hometown – I beg to differ and a desperate attempt to relive my glory days corroborated that “they” are wrong. You can go home again. Thank God.

So, I’ve basically been a 40-year old suburbanite forever. I showed up to an 8th grade dance wearing an oxford cloth button down, pleated khakis which were a hair too short given my husky-sized status, and white bucks – this at a time when Kriss Kross was busy wearing their clothes backward and kept to a busy pants-dropping schedule and most of Pierce Middle School’s Class of ’92 followed suit. I basically wore the same thing to my high school graduation, college move-in day, college graduation day and I think also again last Saturday. I listen to Oldies 103.3 and I don’t know one rap song. I don’t drink coffee because it stunts your growth. I drink light beer. So, I’m an old soul – there are worse crosses to bear.

But, I’ll be honest, somewhere between acquiring our fifth stroller (no, no, you didn’t miss an update, there’s still only one kid!) and leaving a party at 8:30 (to make it home for Matthew’s bath…….aaaanndd maybe a 20/20 Special Editon with Gabby Giffords), I started to panic. Where did my 20s go – or my tween years for that matter. Have I passed my prime? Am I 100? How did I end up in suburbia? And are these the only streets I will ever drive again?

So, with a slight case of the “oh shits” and a renewed lease of life, I told myself that I was still hip and with it and could easily assimilate back into my old city life in the blink of an eye.

When our friends called to hang out – at 2 p.m. so we could sandwich a two hour visit between naps and still be home in time for “suppah” – I jumped at their suggestion to bundle up the babes and head into the city for a stroll.

Move over, city slickers, I’m back!

Step aside yuppies, here come the Grimes’!

DILF with a baby – coming through!

Of course, by the time we get into the city, park, unload the strollers, bundle up the babies, bundle up the parents, and run back to the car twice for forgotten, kidssentials, the temperature has dropped 10 degrees, we’re all hungry and have totally rationalized a stroll to lunch instead.

Now, I’m totally pumped because not only are we back in the city, but we’re going to one of our favorite old watering holes for lunch. Of course, the place has had a makeover since we were there last and I’m pretty sure it was funded by our pints-and-next-day-hangover-eggs that were consumed between ’03 and ’08, so it doesn’t really look like the place we knew and loved…….but after fumbling to get four adults and two strollers through a set of double doors that eight potentially-still-drunk girls were falling out of…….that stench of stale beer, cleaning supplies and curly fries hit us like a ton of bricks. The memories came flooding back. We were home.

For a second.

Looking around, we asked ourselves, was this really the place we spent so much time? Was it always this stanky? And gross? Was it always so loud? Wait, why is it so loud? How can these kids even hear themselves think? Can I hear myself think? What?

So, we forge ahead with slight trepidation, but not enough to deter Your’s Truly in my quest to prove I’ve still got my chops. We navigate over to the hostess – who may have been a senior in high school and wore a really short skirt and ugg boots, which didn’t totally didn’t seem weather-appropriate with a cold front rolling in. Someone should give her a long coat.

When we asked for a table for four with enough room for strollers she looked at us – mouth slightly agape – like we asked for four strollers with table enough for room.

“Huh? Yeah.”

Here we go.

Now, I’m not sure if the patrons thought my buddy Larry, who actually bears a slight resemblance to Keanu Reeves (according to my mother) was actually Ted from Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure (but then we remembered they weren’t old enough to remember that movie) or what, but the proverbial record screeched as we paraded behind the hostess to our extra-large table. The bleach-blond ski bunny wearing neon wayfarers (inside, remember) had the same look of aghast as the couple who were clearly still outfitted from the night before and the 20-something dudes who must have hit a sale on hooded sweatshirts as they bet on games and challenged each other to photo hunt (our favorite bar game, which has now become “erotic photo hunt” in the short time in which I learned how to mow a lawn and change a diaper. Such is life). It was like their parents showed up and busted them. Or like we were outsiders encroaching on their turf.

Sorry, friends, we were actually here first.

So, we sat, scanned the menu, which is much less appetizing when you’re not desperately seeking grease to soak up the suds, and had a million laughs. By the end of the meal our bellies were full of pub grub; our heads and hearts full of memories (or pieces of them) from our inebriated nights there; and our table was full of empty glasses, beer mugs and bottles. The bottles of course were the babies’ and the mugs were full of hot water to warm the aforementioned bottles and the glasses had half a beer left in each one and double rounds of water for the girls.

And then, like that, it was time go. I thought it might be a long, nostalgic walk out there, knowing we were returning to the burbs to take out the trash and get 30 bags of leaves from the lawn to the sidewalk for pick-up.

The truth is, we couldn’t get out there fast enough.

No, really, we couldn’t because our feet were basically stuck to the beer-spattered floor.

And as we made our way out….past the nude photo hunters and the one-night-standers and the wannabe ski bunny and the Sunday Funday revelers who had trickled in for the 4 o’clock game, we all gave each other a look. No words. Just a look.

Finally, I said “I can’t wait to go home again.”

So, “they” were wrong. You CAN go home again. You can’t go back. But you can always go home.

And there’s no place like it.