NOT FITTING IN
All my life I have had trouble adjusting to being back in the United States. People talk about culture shock as the discombobulation that happens when you are suddenly in a country where you don’t know the language or the customs. But for me culture shock, the feeling of being completely unsettled and often depressed, comes when returning to the United States after being in another country for awhile. The reason for me is because being in a place like San Miguel de Allende in Mexico is very stimulating and requires that I be attentive and responsive because I never know what is coming next. A new country makes me feel very alive. And being back in the United States is the same old, same old. Everything is routine and ordinary and often banal. The big box stores seem artificial and void of interest. Nothing is interesting.
This return was no different. Most people feel good to be back where they are comfortable and know their way around, I feel blah.
I stayed the night at my son’s house and in the morning went to my old man’s coffee at the Black Mountain McDonalds. Being among old friends was fun. But from then on it was errands that needed to be done before the snow and ice hit. I went to the Bank of America and got some dollars using my passport as identification since my debit card had vanished when Kaitlyn, who was going to get me some pesos from the ATM in San Miguel, had her purse vanish, dropped or stolen. My debit card was cancelled and a new one is in the mail. I got new windshield wipers at Advance Auto Parts to prepare for the storm. I stocked up on milk and snacks in preparation for being cut off from groceries, bought two small flashlights to use when the power went out as often happens in storms, stopped at Bojangles for chicken. All of this was routine stuff. Then I came to Marshall and hunkered down.
BILLYBABA’S WANDERING 