You Can Go Home Again...

   Wow, October 1st has arrived quickly.  I made it a solid 4 weeks before being tempted home.  I don't know if this makes me a homebody or unadventurous or just plain sad.  But I went home.  I gave up on the weekend, conceeded defeat to the tyrany of emotions that were pulling me back to Minneapolis and relinquished the opportunity to build an Atonement tradition with my housemates.  Ah, well, what's done is done and I don't regret the expense or 4am wake up call to visit what I missed.
   Interestingly, and in retrospect unsurprisingly, I had great anxiety anticipating my trip home that was completely unrealized through the actual experience.  Sound familiar?  I don't consider myself a worrisome person, yet these changes get me down in theory rather than application.  Chicago was a major stressor for the two weeks prior to my departure, yet the experience I've had here has been mostly positive.  Likewise, the notion of going home provoked a great amount of otherwise hidden anxiety.  I decided that was the week to decide what I needed to do with my life, where I needed to go to school, what programs I needed to choose, when I needed to apply/take the GREs/beg for recommendations.  This was a thoroughly unpleasant experience. 
   Midway through the week I called my mom to tell her that I was stressed and that I was going to be poor (this based on information learned from one of my housemates on what her coworkers earn).  I chastised her for the expectations she created for me through the privilege I experienced growing up.  It seems so intimidating to try and provide a middle class experience for oneself when jobs of interest (i.e. jobs that allow me to give a shit about other people) are barely sustainable.  But this seems like another post altogether.  (stay tuned for more ranting and raving I guess)
   Anyway, home.  It seemed the same.  Of course, my room looked different.  Julianna had painted and fancified and created an estrous environment in my previously chillaxed blue bohemian nest.  It looked pretty and she now has an appropiately adult bed rather than my back-knotting futon.  At my parents', my mom had moved my things into my sister's room and vice versa.  It was manageable and I have begun to feel more comfortable back in the freshmanic twin sized beds of my sister's room...and my current room in Chicago.  The people were the same though, still ploughing through schoolwork and running to student group meetings and part-time jobs.  The parties were the same.  Dirty, drunk, reeking of spilled Milwaukee's Best.  I recollect enjoying this experience at one point in the not-so-distant past.  I wasn't feeling it this weekend though. 
   I think perhaps, gasp, I may have changed.  Not very much, but enough to create a disconnect between how I used to live in Minneapolis and how I wanted to stay when I visited for the weekend.  I'm happy I went and I still love the same people (and pets) and enjoy talking with the same friends, and of course I still appreciate the same foods from my favorite restaurants.  I suspect that having been given the opportunity to meet an entirely new group of people and create the identity that I wish to project (of course while being honest to my personality and interests) I have tweaked enough of my activities and motivations that it doesn't quite fit with the expectations I had from my past.
   I think the future freak-out I experienced earlier in the week was a recognition that this dissonance might happen.  It did, but like all things I anticipate, it wasn't so bad.  I holed up in the least distracting corner of the parties to talk with the people I wanted to most interact with.  I made time to honor my desire for personal religious practice.  I shared enough familiar experiences intermixed with enough new experiences (Julianna's nose ring!) that a contented medium was reached.
   I have the opportunity in a few weeks to show my family, when they visit, the life that I have begun to aquaint myself with here.  I'm excited to do so and I hope it doesn't freak them out too much to see these nuanced diversions in interest and intention.