Waking Up in America
I dreamt last night that I chucked up everything and moved to Europe. I don't know where exactly. The place was called Antwerp, but I'm sure it bore little resemblance to the actual Antwerp, since I've neither been there, nor know much about it. Nonetheless I was quite enchanted by my little dream city. It was a beautiful, bustling place, and though I was a bit lost, having made such a rash decision to move, I was not unhappy.
Unlike my ancestors, I'm an American by birth, not choice. On the other hand, most of them were fleeing something when they came here--religious oppression in England, the Irish potato famine, the post-WWI hardships of Germany and Poland.
Do I love my country? My country is hard to love.
I adored Paris, but Paris too has its dark underbelly. It's the only place in the world I've actually seen a child sleeping on the street. A Middle-Eastern boy, about eight years old, was curled up on a blanket on the sidewalk. His sister, perhaps thirteen years-old, was sitting in the doorway behind him, elbows on knees and chin in her hands. She looked numb. Their mother, or possibly grandmother, was also in the doorway, very quietly begging change from passers-by. All summer long in Boston, I'd walked by a dozen panhandlers each day on Boylston St. between Copley and Hynes Convention Center. But at the sight of these three I burst into tears.
"Turns out not where, but who you're with that really matters." (Dave Matthews Band, The Best of What's Around)
I wonder.
