can you go home again?

admittedly, i am more of a Tom Wolf girl than Thomas Wolfe...but yeah... I agree you can't go home again....or can you?

i am sitting in north carolina tonight dealing with all kinds of emotions.    i moved to north carolina, charlotte to be exact, in 1990 for undergrad.   i spent the next 6 years here splitting my time between being a good student, a baby dyke, a fag hag, a young adult dyke with lots of experience, a drug user, a lover, partner and friend.  it is the place where i truly fell in love for the first time (and honestly, at this point so far in my life, the last time i have experienced true love).   i haven't been back here in 14 years.   14 long years.   14 years where my time in north carolina grew into a romantic, whimsical, fantasy life in my head.     a place where all is well.  where the world was safe enough for me to go places that only a diet of ecstasy, acid and crystal would allow.    a world where sleeping off the night before in a cemetery with a beautiful woman was how i started most sundays.  

one of the recent dialogues in therapy for me lately has been that i kind of feel "stuck" in florida.  a lot of this has to do with my relationship with my parents.    my therapist has challenged me to allow myself to at least think about the possibility of leaving.  of moving back to north carolina, atlanta or even my favorite place in the world...alaska...  i really don't  know if i can do it on a practical level... (solo-parenting in a new place would be extra hard, i own a home in florida, my job pays above the national average for my profession)....but if nothing else, i am supposed to at least allow myself to "go there"...

and "going there" is making me feel very uneasy.   it is scary.   just like so many other things in this band process...if i look outside my safe cocoon i may have to admit that i am not happy/comfortable/content as i pretend to be.   and what good does that admission do me if i am not willing (or able) to do anything anyways.   sigh.  i don't even know if i am making sense at this point but i just need to get this out.

i mean i am a fool if i think i can just pick up my life and move to a place that i haven't been to in 14 years and expect it to be ok.   the place has changed.  i have changed.  i am no longer a student, a drug user or footloose and fancy-free like i was when i was here.   i am a mother.   a career woman.  i am healthier in so many ways.     does that mean i need to stay in florida?  no.   does it mean i need to make major decisions with my head and not my emotions? yes.  but don't my emotions and happiness count for anything.   will i be happy if i stay in florida?  i don't know.   but right now i need to stay there.   my daughter needs to be close to her grandparents.    she needs stability.   

before this whole idea of being "stuck" came up in therapy my plan had been to drive down to charlotte on friday and go visit my old haunts.  at this point i have talked myself out of it.  i don't think my heart can bear seeing charlotte right now...on either end of the spectrum...i don't want to see all the growth and changes that will kill my version of charlotte in my head.   and i don't want to see all the things, places, lifestyle that i loved.  that i wanted to raise a child in.   

then i thought on friday i would go to the mountains to see the place i spent many of my summers as a child at camp.  

but now i think i may find a high-end spa and treat myself to a massage and facial.  or i may go to a water park and have fun.  or do both.

or i may just stay in my hotel room and hide from my fantasies, my mind and my heart.