Observations

Blog, it's at this time of the night that I start missing home and wish that I were back up in the frigid Minnesota air. I don't care how bitter it is, I shouldn't be able to wear a t-shirt outside like I did today.

But I did wear a t-shirt outside and it was wonderful. The sun shone inbetween the kind of clouds your mind finagles into various animals on a summer's day and we drove on winding roads through Carolinian forests. It's not strange that this is my life now. It's strange that it's not strange that this is my life now. Each night is a new hotel, preferably Microtel (they have window seats that allow you to comfortably look over their parking lots). Each day hundreds of children point and laugh at me and Andy. He is really the only constant I have in my life. It's him and our car, Forrest Gimp. Everything else is dictated by what we have on our schedule. Tonight I'm in a Target Starbucks on the outer edge of Gastonia, NC. I think it's by Charlotte, but it doesn't matter. Everyone has that drawl that hasn't lost its charm, but isn't as novel as it was when I first arrived just a few weeks ago. I've settled into tour. They told me this would happen by week three. I anticipated this would happen by week three. And now it's week three and it's everything I thought it would be, yet I can't quite grasp that this is my daily reality.

Like, wearing this hat isn't weird at all. Seriously. 

During yesterday's show, a little girl asked me what would happen if the sun died while I was recapping what we could use for renewable resources. Today I felt a wisp of a hug around my waist and realized it just in time to see my admirer run off and join her friends. This morning I had a volunteer by the name of Alberto try and ward off Andy's evil villain with the sign I asked him to hold. All in a day's work.

But after we pack up our set and settle into whatever hotel we've managed to find, I'm perusing Facebook and reading emails and am seeing what I've missed. Friends are having babies, my band is performing without me, and my niece just turned two. It's hard, and I can't imagine being here without an internet lifeline to home. The other night Andy observed that I'm not really missing home in the sense of longing, but I'm instead missing it as a part of myself. He was right. I feel like there is a part of me that must remain dormant until I return. Five more weeks and I'll be there, and of course once that rolls around I'm sure I'll be bitching and moaning about all the North Carolinian idiosyncrasies that are no longer a part of my life. We can't have it all, I guess.



For now, I'll just look longingly at this.