En Saskatchewan
by Steve Gajadhar
It’s cold and flat and home, or at least the place I grew up. But after almost 7 years away it just doesn’t feel like home anymore. Cold and flat have almost completely lost whatever poetry they once held.
Saskatchewan is now something to tug at me, like a yearbook dug out so you can read the farewell signatures your friends made in the back. So when I hear the Les Trois Accords song or catch the movie The Accused, the novelty memories, the good ones, the shiny ones come flooding back to make me smile, phone my mother, email some of the boys and think about being home even though being home is never as grand as the romantic ideal of coming home. I never seem to learn this lesson. I set the date in my Outlook calendar and from then on I experience time in discrete chunks of anticipation. 2 months to go, 2 weeks, 2 days, 2 hours. Yet as my foot takes its first step on the plane, I wish I was staying. Now I count the time until I return. 2 weeks, 2 days, 2 hours. I think there is some deep human truth in this, but I can’t find the words to illuminate it.
You can never go home…well you know, and I don’t want to. I’m happy having Saskatchewan as the place that family and friends will forever bind me to. The place I have left but will always be leaving. And so whenever I’m headed west on the Trans-Canada and I see the sign:
I’ll always be happy and sad.
It’s cold and flat and home, or at least the place I grew up. But after almost 7 years away it just doesn’t feel like home anymore. Cold and flat have almost completely lost whatever poetry they once held.
Saskatchewan is now something to tug at me, like a yearbook dug out so you can read the farewell signatures your friends made in the back. So when I hear the Les Trois Accords song or catch the movie The Accused, the novelty memories, the good ones, the shiny ones come flooding back to make me smile, phone my mother, email some of the boys and think about being home even though being home is never as grand as the romantic ideal of coming home. I never seem to learn this lesson. I set the date in my Outlook calendar and from then on I experience time in discrete chunks of anticipation. 2 months to go, 2 weeks, 2 days, 2 hours. Yet as my foot takes its first step on the plane, I wish I was staying. Now I count the time until I return. 2 weeks, 2 days, 2 hours. I think there is some deep human truth in this, but I can’t find the words to illuminate it.
You can never go home…well you know, and I don’t want to. I’m happy having Saskatchewan as the place that family and friends will forever bind me to. The place I have left but will always be leaving. And so whenever I’m headed west on the Trans-Canada and I see the sign:
I’ll always be happy and sad.
posted by Steve Gajadhar | 12:37 am
7 Comments:
I didn't know you were from Moose Jaw, Steve! And I didn't know Moose Jaw was 'the friendly city'!
I get physically sick going back to places where I used to live. I don't know why. It doesn't always happen. I think my body remembers things I don't. I think it's selective recall of anxious moments.
The beauty of life is in our dreams of the future and our memories of the past. Often, the present is just work.
Oh, how I remember this feeling! The great thing about going "home" is that everyone knows you. The not so great thing is they don't know who you're becoming.
So Christmas hits early in Moose Jaw. Have a good one.
Just played some hockey last night...
I was lost.
I wonder if that means I'm losing my Canadianness?
awwww....I am from Saskatchewan too, Maple Creek, I still have family in Saskatoon, however, I'm a west coast girl, couldn't plant me back in the prairies for nothing!
and you couldn't play hockey!!! OMG!!! get out there man and practise!!
lovely post Steve.
You've found plenty good words, Steve, to describe a feeling that is for most, undescribable.
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