you look like a photograph of yourself taken from far away

I no longer recognize the city in which I grew up.  Apart from the iconic tower, it feels vague and unfamiliar, like a city I have seen in pictures but never walked through the streets at night.  And this is strange because I have walked through these streets at night, half drunk and wholly broken, looking for things I could never find.  I have walked every street, wearing every colour.  Now the streets are different, the buildings are taller.  (I took this photo from the 54th floor of a building that did not exist when I lived here.)

What has not changed - probably never will - is my own reflection in the mirror when I visit this city.  The dryness causes my skin to look chalky, the blood drains away, I become white and dead, except for my eyes, which become irritated and red and dry.  And hyper alert.  I am watching for something that may try to kill and eat me.  My hair is full of static, and my hands shrink in the cold; my rings slip off my fingers.  This is what it feels like to come home.

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The presentation was nice and safe.  My mother spoke well.  (I wondered what the actual fuck she was talking about, but she said it very well.)  I ate little pieces of food speared with sticks, and made small talk with strangers who knew all about my life (my mother's version, not mine) and about whom I knew nothing.  I think this mattered to my mother very much, and probably to my father too.  I was happy to travel with J, now an adult, rather than alone, and to catch her eye at odd moments that I used to bear alone.  My mother's OCD was in full bloom and J noticed; she did not used to notice when she was younger.  This made the trip easier on me, but perhaps harder on her.  I am awash in gratitude and regret, sipping red wine from a white wine glass, and nibbling at a fried thing on a stick.  Oh yes, so proud.  So wonderful.  Such a triumph.


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