Room clearout

[cybermule]

One of the dubious advantages of clearing out my room is that all sorts of scribblings come out of the woodwork. Nearly literally. This one was from "Oranges are not the Only Fruit", and just grabbed my interest at the time:

Over the years, I did my best to win a prize; some wish to better the world and still scorn it. But I never succeeded; there's a formula, a secret, I don't know what, that people who have been to public school or Brownies seem to understand. It runs right the way through life, though it starts with hyacinth growing, passes through milk monitor and finishes somewhere at half-blue.


I think I snagged this a while ago, as it reminded me of my very first day at infant school. We had good old fashioned christian assembly, with hymns and all. And I noticed that pretty much all the other kids knew all the words to the hymns. They all knew each other, too, as they all went to the same church, the same church playgroup; later, the same Am Dram group, Venture Scouts and pub.

Then they all married each other.

Anyway, that feeling of missing out on something was pretty much my first social experience in life.

Comments

[hydroplanechrst.livejournal.com]

hmm, there's something very beautiful and poetic about this. Not so much you're feelings of missing out, but how u capture the feeling of shedding the past. :)

I grew up in the same neighborhood my whole life into early adulthood, and today have little feeling of community there despite the very deep familiarities I remember everytime I drive through. That the entire area has changed drastically since I was kid only deepens it further.

[cybermule.livejournal.com]

It's weird - I often visit my home town, as my family are still there, but it feels quite strange to me. I know it so well, yet I've somehow outgrown it.

[hydroplanechrst.livejournal.com]

Outgrown it meaning you feel like you don't belong there? It is weird every time I go home and visit, which I'm getting ready to do in the next few weeks actually. I think the strangest part is going through an area and remembering it as it was when you were really young. What happened to that little kid? lol Ah well, life goes on. :)

[cybermule.livejournal.com]

Outgrown it in that I don't think I could be happy there right now - I want different things out of life, and it seems very small and over-intimate. I might well move back there if I were to have kids, though :)

[hydroplanechrst.livejournal.com]

I think like that about my home too. There's a kind of constrained feeling whenever I go back there, like I'm missing out on the rest of the world.