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new jersey, 9/24-9/28
I lived in New Jersey for two years. Two years is long enough to get attached, but not long enough for a return to feel like a homecoming. What it feels like--and yes, no doubt there's some personal history behind this analogy--is like seeing an old girlfriend. You remember with sudden vividness all the things you loved about her, and all the things that got on your nerves. Worse, there are little pockets of unfamiliarity, and you don't know why: Has she changed? Or have you forgotten? Or were these things about her that you never even noticed?
So: New Jersey is still beautiful. If you've never been there--or if you've only been to the turnpike and Newark Airport--you don't know how green it is. My camera's battery died just before I crossed the border from Pennsylvania, an hour before sundown when the sun makes everything glow, and I was sad not to get the photographs, but I still got to see it. As darkness fell I left the interstate to take the back roads I used to drive, back when the freeway scared me, through old-growth suburbs and past Fort Nonsense into Morristown.
And New Jersey still has terrible traffic (the next day, a half-hour standstill on the way to New York!) and the worst signage in the country (misleading or simply false, where they bother to put it up at all) and the most confusing roads (every town has a road named after every other nearby town, and none of them match up across town borders, and none of them lead to the town they're named for), and the curious property that, no matter where you are and where you are trying to get to, there is no good driving route from here to there.
And Jersey Boy Bagels is still the Home of the Eggel, and the Edison Family Restaurant still claims to have the World's Best Oatmeal (and is still correct, as far as I know), and the libraries and banks and post offices and train stations are still grand old brick stalwarts, and the churches are grander still. But was that house in Plainfield always lavender? And when did the abandoned mall downtown, or any mall anywhere, get carpeting? And Clearview has been buying up all the old Bob Roberts art house movie theaters. And the Afghan restaurant is still there, but the gigantic U.S. flag in the window is new. But the guy at the Sweet Dreams Cafe still recognized my face, and that felt good.
Near the post office I looked down at the curb and saw "I LOVE SEAN" etched in angular letters into the curb. I don't know who wrote it, but I can guess that she was in high school or not far from it, and I can guess that she doesn't love Sean anymore. Does she still live in Morristown? Does she walk by it on her way to buy stamps or send a package? What does she think when she sees her youthful love still proclaimed there? How many years has it been?
So: New Jersey is still beautiful. If you've never been there--or if you've only been to the turnpike and Newark Airport--you don't know how green it is. My camera's battery died just before I crossed the border from Pennsylvania, an hour before sundown when the sun makes everything glow, and I was sad not to get the photographs, but I still got to see it. As darkness fell I left the interstate to take the back roads I used to drive, back when the freeway scared me, through old-growth suburbs and past Fort Nonsense into Morristown.
And New Jersey still has terrible traffic (the next day, a half-hour standstill on the way to New York!) and the worst signage in the country (misleading or simply false, where they bother to put it up at all) and the most confusing roads (every town has a road named after every other nearby town, and none of them match up across town borders, and none of them lead to the town they're named for), and the curious property that, no matter where you are and where you are trying to get to, there is no good driving route from here to there.
And Jersey Boy Bagels is still the Home of the Eggel, and the Edison Family Restaurant still claims to have the World's Best Oatmeal (and is still correct, as far as I know), and the libraries and banks and post offices and train stations are still grand old brick stalwarts, and the churches are grander still. But was that house in Plainfield always lavender? And when did the abandoned mall downtown, or any mall anywhere, get carpeting? And Clearview has been buying up all the old Bob Roberts art house movie theaters. And the Afghan restaurant is still there, but the gigantic U.S. flag in the window is new. But the guy at the Sweet Dreams Cafe still recognized my face, and that felt good.
Near the post office I looked down at the curb and saw "I LOVE SEAN" etched in angular letters into the curb. I don't know who wrote it, but I can guess that she was in high school or not far from it, and I can guess that she doesn't love Sean anymore. Does she still live in Morristown? Does she walk by it on her way to buy stamps or send a package? What does she think when she sees her youthful love still proclaimed there? How many years has it been?