I got no place to go back too. I don’t have anyone waiting for me anywhere.
Anon goes home
Submitted 1 day ago by Early_To_Risa@sh.itjust.works to greentext@sh.itjust.works
https://sh.itjust.works/pictrs/image/92695f0f-3f40-4b60-929e-1925e7a933bb.jpeg
Comments
MisterNeon@lemmy.world 1 day ago
henfredemars@infosec.pub 1 day ago
If it’s any consolation, I just returned home because of a death in the family. And while things are nostalgic, they’re also completely different, and I know that the time and experiences I had when I was a child will never be the same again.
I can go back to the place, but I can never go back to the time. Things have changed. I’m on a new adventure, in a different chapter of my life story. Many of my friends are gone. Their stories have ended. Mine continues.
PhobosAnomaly@feddit.uk 1 day ago
Beautifully put.
I love my home town. It’s lovely, quaint, and consistently ranks somewhere on the “best places to live in” surveys. I was really fortunate to grow up there, even if I didn’t realise it at the time.
I flew the nest, found my own path, and moved around a bit. I’ve settled six hundred miles away - and with the numbers of folk in my family slowly starting to dwindle, I’m finding fewer and fewer reasons to go back home.
I miss my formative years, but rather than grieve for them, I’m thankful for growing up somewhere that gave me a lot of joy and good memories. I may not have grown up where I am now, but it’s where my other half and my kids are, and that’s home now.
merc@sh.itjust.works 1 day ago
Also, some things haven’t changed, but should have.
Yeah, the kitchen smells the same, mom’s laugh is the same, dad’s still using the same chipped mug.
But, dad’s prejudices haven’t changed, they’ve only calcified a bit more. Mom’s learned helplessness has only gotten worse. The old disagreements never got resolved, they just got shelved, ready to be taken down again when the time comes.
Plus, the parents think that you, their kid, hasn’t changed. They still see you as helpless and in need of their guidance, even when they’re having increasing difficulty navigating the world because things are changing too quickly for them to handle. Hence the old meme of “take your resume, walk right into that office, and demand a job!”
I get the appeal of nostalgia, and it’s sometimes fun to pretend that things haven’t changed, but it’s better to realize that time keeps marching forward and try to adapt to the new situation.
Paradachshund@lemmy.today 1 day ago
I’m a bit older than this and I’ve been feeling this too. Getting older is weird.
Track_Shovel@slrpnk.net 1 day ago
It really hits when kids you knew when you were an adult are now adults. That, and when you start thinking ahead. 10 years from now, my mom will be 75…
SubArcticTundra@lemmy.ml 1 day ago
You feel like a time traveller.
Pincer@sh.itjust.works 1 day ago
You are.
rain_enjoyer@sopuli.xyz 1 day ago
UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 1 day ago
We brought the past with us. We’re still here and we’re advancing our historical works into the future.
So much of what was old is new again. So much of what was new is now a bedrock upon which the next thing is built.
Do a bit of digging and you’ll find it. Do a bit of listening and you can still hear history echo.
dejected_warp_core@lemmy.world 20 hours ago
You can never really go home.
Fuck.
lessthanluigi@lemmy.sdf.org 19 hours ago
The whole point of Falling Down
devilish666@lemmy.world 1 day ago
tanisnikana@lemmy.world 1 day ago
I yearn for the time when I was a kid. I yearn for the time when the right side of my body functioned almost as good as the left. I yearn to be picked up by my dad, to sneak chocolate chips out of the baking cupboard instead of just buying the damn things from the store. I yearn for my birthday to be an event with gifts and a day I’d anticipate two weeks in advance, instead of remembering I missed it again the following morning, after having spent my birthday at work. I yearn for summers off and I yearn for fifty dollars to be a lot of money with no responsibility.
I yearn for time.
Carnelian@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Personally I’m just yearning for Silksong
InvalidName2@lemmy.zip 1 day ago
I’ve kind of been on both sides of this.
For me, returning to and then leaving my home town triggers feelings of melancholy but also relief. I didn’t grow up in a stable, solidly middle-class (or higher) lifestyle, so I’m sure that’s a factor.
While I had a good childhood and loving parents, things got complicated the older I became. And even when I happen upon a reminder of the good times or a fond memory, way too often it’s tainted by how fucked up things were at the time.
On the other hand, “the kids” … it’s wonderful when they’re home for summer. When they’re at my house, at least I know they are safe, happy, and that all their needs are being met, in as much as possible. It’s sad to see them go, when I know it’s going to be months before they’re back.
But also, it’s a sigh of relief when my life can go back to being on my terms sans drama and chaos. It’s almost total bliss when I can go out to the kitchen in my undies for a cup of coffee fully confident that the milk jug won’t be sitting in the fridge completely empty (or with a minuscule amount of milk remaining so as to be practically useless but also technically not empty).
waftastic@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Expected this to take a dark turn because anon, was not prepared for warm poetic nostalgia in its place.
r4venw@sh.itjust.works 1 day ago
>be me >have been avoiding my parents’ house for over a decade
frog@feddit.uk 1 day ago
Wholesome.
Ghyste@sh.itjust.works 1 day ago
Wholesome, reminiscent, and melancholy.
Monster96@lemmy.world 1 day ago
I still yearn for the past some days. Days when I would see friends everyday. Days when I didn’t have to worry about bills. Days when things were simpler and easy. But, I realize that my life isn’t as bad as I thought. Parents rarely fight now. We have money and I’m, for the first time, financially stable. And, I still have a good relationship with my parents. When I visit them, I still go back to when I was a kid. Mom and dad would make my favorite food, I now have access to all my favorite cartoons from when I was a kid thanks to streaming. The big difference is now I can actually help them financially and physically as opposed when I was a scrawny, poor shrimp. I sometimes miss those days, but I’m making the best of what I have now
jupyter_rain@discuss.tchncs.de 1 day ago
Man, I miss having almost no responsibilities and more time on my hands. But I really appreciate your viewpoint, gonna steal this positivity :) Guess my life could be much worse, made some errors but a lot of things turned out nice. Living a better life than my parents at my current age and there are even possibilities for a way upward.
Wirlocke@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 day ago
I’m still young at 25, but I can see the hallmarks of aging. I’ve moved to a new state for 5 years now and when I visited my old home it felt half foreign, half familiar. I’m the youngest so my mom’s age is starting to show.
Things I consider recent are now described as “years ago”. I’m seeing things evolve through life. Things that felt like they had a beginning, middle, end now are starting up again. Almost like a ride that’s resetting for the next ones in line.
bytesonbike@discuss.online 1 day ago
The biggest sign of aging for me is when you make a reference to a TV show and the person you share it with goes, “ah that was before my time.” Then, you realize it wasn’t released a few years ago… But more like a decade or two ago.
The biggest hit was someone who asked me about 9/11 because they weren’t alive at the time.
Jiggle_Physics@sh.itjust.works 1 day ago
The other day I was talking in a common interest discord and mentioned that I largely moved from console to PC games in the late 90s. To which I was met with a “jfc how old are you?”
UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 1 day ago
What sticks out to me, in hindsight, is how much of the development that happened in my early childhood. I remember the large empty track of land next to the highway that was turned into the local mega-mall. I remember the highway itself transforming from a simple flat two-lanes-each-way stretch all the way into downtown. Now its a six-lane overpass that’s getting another expansion. I remember the old community swimming pool that’s been expanded into a sprawling Aquatic Center. And how the half dozen different church denominations have been consolidated into one big Catholic compound. We have this enormous City Center that was just an abandoned parking lot when my parents moved in.
I also remember how the neighborhood had been comically, painfully white. Way back in the 90s, the town was effectively built on White Flight from the inner city, so it was mostly business and engineer families who’d abandoned downtown. We had a few big immigrant communities, primarily East Asian in character. But Latinos and Black families were kept beyond the county line by a combination of notoriously racist policing and white nationalist affiliated developers and real estate agencies. But all of that lapsed over the subsequent decades - now we have a much more mixed and more minority-affluent population. Hell, we have an East Asian County Judge, which is something that the elderly white now-minority had been fighting tooth and nail for decades.
I have no idea whether I’d say the area is better or worse. The fact that there’s still a ton of money being pumped through the city doesn’t hurt. But there’s definitely a noticeable divide between the older and newer parts of the town.
sharkfucker420@lemmy.ml 1 day ago
I wish I had that nostalgia for my hometown. Aoproaching it just fills me with dread. I hate so much about that place
enkille@lemmy.world 1 day ago
originally from the rural southern usa, i do not miss it
Gork@sopuli.xyz 1 day ago
Was in a car with some coworkers and I realized I’m now the oldest one in the car.
skisnow@lemmy.ca 1 day ago
It’s nice seeing my parents but everything else in my hometown is depressing.
The things that have changed are depressing because they represent lost youth. But, the things that stayed the same are also depressing, because it means the same bunch of people just spent 30 years on a treadmill and got nowhere.
Rekorse@sh.itjust.works 1 day ago
Spending 30 years doing the same thing doesnt mean they weren’t happy. Thats quite an assumption to make.
skisnow@lemmy.ca 1 day ago
You’re the one that made an assumption. I said nothing about whether I thought they were happy, but you couldn’t resist the opportunity to get sanctimonious.
MehBlah@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Must be nice to have had a childhood that evokes that vibe.
DarrinBrunner@lemmy.world 21 hours ago
After both parents died, we four kids sold the house. It’s still “home”, but it’s not ours anymore. That home exists only in our memories, as do our parents. At 60, I’m the youngest of the four of us, so they’ll all be dying sooner than later. I take better care of myself than any of them, so I’ll probably be the last to go. Then it will only be my son left. He’s adamant that he doesn’t want kids, and I fully understand. Our family name will die with him.
That’s life.
JoeBigelow@lemmy.ca 9 hours ago
And so it goes
grrgyle@slrpnk.net 1 day ago
I want to stay in my kitchen forever lol.
I’m fortunate to have had a great childhood full of love and community, but I don’t want to be a child, you know? I don’t want to go back to, like, a cocoon.
Maybe I’m reading into some of these comments, or maybe I just have a different nostalgia. Just leaving this comment for anyone else who’s a bit weirded out. 👋
lightnsfw@reddthat.com 1 day ago
For a lot of people just about every aspect of adult life sucks. You cant afford anything, your job is stressful as hell, everywhere you go costs money, your responsible for your own healthcare, etc.
It’s not weird at all to be nostalgic about your childhood where you were happy, loved, and carefree (if you were fortunate enough to have had a childhood like that).
ricecake@sh.itjust.works 1 day ago
I think it’s just different people being in different places in their lives. For some people the stability and safety of the childhood home isn’t something they’ve replicated elsewhere yet, so the nostalgia is all they really have left of that feeling.
Even then they might not want to go back, but just be acutely feeling an absence of that type of security.
I’m sort of in the middle. I have a safe, stable and comfortable environment, and I’m doing my best to preserve that for my kids. I can also remember the feeling of childhood familiarity and just knowing how things will be, and not having the responsibility to keep that stability be mine. And that’s a comfortable blanket.
Not one I would want to live in, but having lost both my parents I do wish I could pull that blanket over my lap for a bit every once in a while.Lucky_777@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Normal feelings. I had a decent childhood. My parents fought all the time but nothing beyond that. Still don’t want to be in my childhood kitchen forever.
slaacaa@lemmy.world 1 day ago
I’m in the second half of my 30s now. I own the house I grew up in, it’s in bad shape, actually about to have it renovated it now. I live and work in a different country for a few years now, making a lot of money, but I dearly miss home. The street, the trees, all the memories of my childhood. It’s in the nice suburbs of an Eastern EU capital, so it has developed/gentrified well, with modern services and stores not far. My father is dead, my mother lives 3 streets from this house, which is also great.
Wife and I are actually considering moving back in a few years, after the renovation is finished. Some things feel priceless - to think we could raise a family in the same house in the same neighbourhood, have our children ride their bike under the same trees, next to the same small stream. None of this would of course be worth it, if you couldn’t make a living there, so we are in a lucky situation, and I understand many are not.
Still, I wonder if this is just some nostalgia for easier times, and if it makes sense to “throw away” a safe life in Western EU that many from this country would kill for, chasing a feeling like this. On the other hand, I think people spend their whole life trying to feel loved, successful and happy, so what else is really there? We can have all the rational components like health, safety and money in place, yet still feel unfulfilled inside.
If we are lucky to live to an old age, we’ll look back on our life to search for meaning and reflect on our choices, what will make the biggest difference? I honestly don’t know
grrgyle@slrpnk.net 1 day ago
It sounds like you’re comfortable enough to be debt free, but still chasing after something more, despite already having it right there in your backyard.
I don’t think you realize how little money you need in order to have a fulfilling life. You can live in the nice neighbourhood and take a low paying, stable job, be frugal, get good insurance, and enjoy the advantages of your class position.
Pardon me if this comes off as overly prescriptive or nihilistic.
slaacaa@lemmy.world 23 hours ago
Thanks, good and on point reflection.
I am definitely guilty of always wanting to chase bigger/better things.
Wife and I together are pulling a quarter of a million euros per year now, and even if tax eats a large part of it, that is an incredible salary even in Western EU, especially for people from ex-Soviet countries. Yet I was unhappy that I didn’t make a promotion that would add only around 30k on this, but I wanted the prestige and recognition that comes with it.
You’re right that we only have very little debt, I could pay it off tomorrow, but it’s so cheap it’s better to keep it and finance the renovation from our savings. After that, we could move back to the renivated house in our home city, take a 50% salary cut, and still be fine.
Let’s see what the future brings. I’m getting closer and closer to perspective you share in your comment. My unhappiest friend is a millionaire entrepreneur living in Dubai for tax reasons, with 2 kids in expensive private school, fancy apartment with own staff, and a wife that doesn’t seem to love him anymore. I envy his business success, but not his life, and he himself told me we would trade most of his money for a better marriage.
Life is weird, and it’s even weirder that I have some of the deepest and most meaningful online discussions about it with strangers under greentexts.
steeznson@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Fake: Anon has an idyllic homelife
Gay: Anon is emotionally well-adjusted
lessthanluigi@lemmy.sdf.org 1 day ago
Fellas, is it gay to be emotionally well-adjusted?
blarghly@lemmy.world 6 hours ago
The adjustment knob is on your prostate
lime@feddit.nu 1 day ago
that stability is incredible. i’ve never really had it. i moved out at 15, after my parents’ divorce, and by the time i was done with uni i’d moved 12 times. at that point nobody in the extended family had their original living spaces left, if they were even still alive.
DistrictSIX@lemmy.zip 1 day ago
Kind of reminds me of this beautiful poem:
“…And I will leave. but the birds will stay, singing: and my garden will stay, with its green tree, and its white water well…
Many afternoons the skies will be calm and blue, and the bells in the belfry will chime, like they’re chiming this very afternoon.
The people who have loved me will die, and the town will burst anew every year.
And in the corner of my green, flowering whitewashed garden, my spirit will wander nostalgic from tree to well.
And I will leave, and I’ll be lonely, without a home, without a green tree, without a white water well, without calm and blue skies…
And the birds will stay, singing.”
-‘El viaje definitivo’ by Juan Ramón Jiménez
OrteilGenou@lemmy.world 1 day ago
There’s a pretty good chance the house I grew up in will be bulldozed to build a condo complex. The 100+ year-old oak tree might survive, but more than likely it’ll be cut down, as will the maples and the plum tree.
The birds will move on.
LaLuzDelSol@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Yeah, I noticed in my late 20s that the world has changed from my childhood. All my childhood sports heroes have retired. New music genres have replaced what I heard on the radio. A lot of my old haunts are still there, but some have been knocked down and replaced. It’s an… unsettling feeling when you realize the ground is moving beneath your feet. The best thing you can do is to keep moving yourself (figuratively, not literally). Explore new places, make new hobbies. Fill up your time with new experiences and you won’t have as much of a sense of loss.
lightnsfw@reddthat.com 1 day ago
But all the new stuff is enshittified by capitalism so it’s not as enjoyable as the old stuff.
jaemo@sh.itjust.works 1 day ago
The best is when you are lying in bed at night and some odd mix of neurotransmitters unlocks a memory you haven’t thought of in years, and then you spend an hour crying about the gulf of time between then and now, for what/who you’ve lost, and managing the crushing guilt that follows when you feel awful about not tending to the garden of your memories better.
rumba@lemmy.zip 1 day ago
Aging brings along the realization of how many things only exist in your memory, and even if they are recorded or memorialized no one will ever experience them the way you did.
That restaurant with your parents, That Mall, staying with distant family in some house that was sold 30 years ago or outright bulldozed. Those places are only special to you, and when you cease to exist, they won’t be special in the same exact way to anyone else. It’s the stupid childhood memories that honestly don’t mean anything on their own that feel the worst IMO
kshade@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Almost 40 here, I feel the same. Some things evolve, some things get replaced and some mostly stay the same, but the worst is when it feels stagnant or even decaying. That’s worse than actual loss in some ways.
Opisek@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Damn onion ninjas
JetpackJackson@feddit.org 20 hours ago
They must be here too…
henfredemars@infosec.pub 1 day ago
My elementary school is now a neighborhood. But I still walk down the road, and looking at the landscape, I know I stood here as a child wondering what the future might hold. It’s very strange. I feel like I have the memories of a different person.
GraniteM@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Zoomboingding@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Is it 30,000 pounds of bananas? I bet it’s 30,000 pounds of bananas.
wolfeh@lemmy.blahaj.zone 21 hours ago
I ate 30,000 pounds of bananas during a road trip once. I was on my way to see the biggest ball of twine in Minnesota.
QuantumTickle@lemmy.zip 1 day ago
My parents worked to manufacture this. The white picket fence. The wave to your neighbor that you regularly have over. The Dishonest Harmony…
My parents are christian trumpers. And if I could move farther away, I would.
If you have this, hold onto it.
gmtom@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Everything stays, but it still chnages.
jupyter_rain@discuss.tchncs.de 1 day ago
The only constant thing in life is change.
blarghly@lemmy.world 6 hours ago
> be me
> go home because parents guilted me into it
> first step out the airport. It’s 1000000° and the air is sticky asf
> IveMadeAHugeMistake.jpg
> house is a wreck. random bullshit piled to the ceiling in spare rooms just like when I was a kid
> mom bitching about brown people. same bitching I’ve heard all my life
> dad talking about how he’s gonna retire soon. yeah right. what would he do with his time if he wasnt working?
> feel melancholy and hopelessness setting in
> tfw you realize you have to live like this for 2 more days until your flight