Radio ‘round these here parts typically sucks, this being one of those small Southern towns, heavy on the bro country and Prot pop (ugh); but every now & then it comes through. Internally, the radio has also not been great lately, due to recent events aggravating the ol’ AVPD, cranking up the volume on my symptoms, the paranoia heightening like spiny gray urchins of static, ballooning, blurring out even the good channels, the important channels. An objectively horrible person, tense, scattered, sleepless, this morning rushing out the door already late for an appointment I’d forgotten about, now speeding along sans caffeine or makeup, jabbing the radio buttons, seeking something, anything, to do the job of caffeine & makeup for me – when what should I hear but, of all songs, “Let’s Go” by Trick Daddy, a song they never play anymore, much less in this town, a song that I haven’t heard in many years – a song which bears the honor of being my official “coming out as a rap lover” song 20+ years ago, the one that I came out of hiding for back in high school, having pretended for so many years that I was too cool for that shit, turning up my nose at it, pretending to exclusively like the obscure, “cool”, “edgy”, “punk rock” stuff that the cool, edgy, punk rock kids would approve of, until one day I heard this one & knew that i could not, would not hide a minute longer. Windows down, volume up, sunshine, the cool spring wind in my scraggly unwashed hair! It’s ok after all! When I tell you it hit like a hefty dose of the best drug, and all those spiny edges melted, momentarily illumined inside, all fresh & soft. I know as a Catholic I’m not supposed to like this shit, but man, when I tell you it felt so healing, it felt like the Voice of God right beside me, gently whispering:

nos·​taul·​sea /nəˈstôlzēə/ (n) the synchronous sensation of queasiness and homesickness, of fondness and sorrow and disgust, that one feels upon returning to their place of origin/the location in which they spent their formative years

I was back in [name of town redacted] today.

The way it all comes back to you, just flying rudely in your face, lurking around every turn waiting to attack: the cringe and the horror, hitting like a punch to the gut and leaving you breathless. (Ugh, that really did happen.) I hate it here.

But also, lurking around the very same turns, the fond memories of innocent times. The sweetness and the sadness because this place is different now, and the place where I grew up will never exist again. A ghost town even in six lanes of traffic. The ache of grief for something irrevocably lost.

The way it all comes back to you, the smell of mom’s minivan on a hot day and those blue cushions in the kids’ section of the public library that’s since relocated. the obnoxious tune of that one radio jingle you haven’t heard in decades. Realizing how old you are and how relentless is the passage of time.

An abandoned overgrown lot where there used to be kmart – the smells of Little Caesars and hiding in the cheap clothing racks, small.

The way it all comes back to you.

How immediate the past is, always, after all. It’s just time, just days and nights are all that separate us from the past, isn’t it, which sounds obvious but doesn’t always feel that way – sometimes it feels like there’s a locked door or at least some kind of barrier, but it’s just days, nights, and days. You can go somewhere else, but you can’t escape it.

The inevitability of the place.

Like looking too hard in a mirror.

I love it here, honestly. It’s objectively the best place in the world. I can’t stomach it. The nostalgia. I never want to come here again. Get me as far away as possible. How could I ever want to live anywhere else?

When I die, tell them to bury me here: to return me to what I’m made of, dust to dust. It only makes sense. The inevitability. The nausea. It never could have been any other way.

the funnest part, by far, was creating new Sims: choosing their name, appearance, outfits, personality, voice, strengths & weaknesses, basic relationships, & etc. I’d spend so much time on this, on figuring out who my Sim was. It was pure molten fun, almost too much fun. I get a little ghost of a thrill even remembering the Create A Sim screen and its little elevator music.

Designing and building the Sim’s home — that part was exciting, initially, but it got boring quickly. All that constructing, shopping, installing, color-coordinating, making sure things were in the correct places: it got kind of tedious. I’d often rush through it, towards the end.

And then, the game itself: actually playing. Doing life. Events, occurrences, interactions, incidents. Eh; that was cool and all, but significantly less thrilling than making a new Sim. I’d often get bored with the action and just go back to the drawing board to start over with a new character. Designing the Sims themselves, that was the most engaging, and for me the most time-consuming part – the one part that I was a perfectionist about.

Sometimes, I get the sense I’m doing this same exact thing with my actual life. Spending all my time trying to figure out the character, rather than just playing the game.

Look at this blog. All this navel-gazey business of “figuring out who I am.” Questions that keep me up at night. My thoughts. “About Me.” Look at me, I am this way, I am that way. Personality typology. Daily prompts. What is going on in my brain. I am this, I am not that, I hate this, I love that, and why? Even writing this post, right now, I’m doing the thing. I’m still in Create A Sim, at 36.

Maybe this is a bad way to be? Maybe this is the wrong way to play the game? I wonder if after I’m dead I’ll look back on my earthly life and go “damn!, I spent all that time figuring out the character, and so little time being her. Did I even play? Where was the action? What was the plot?”

But on the other hand, ya know, maybe, this is how I be this character. Our society loves doers, but thinkers are just as valid, aren’t we? Maybe this is an okay way to exist. I do love a good character-driven story; plot is, after all, overrated. And I mean, The Sims was a game with neither plot nor rules, after all. I think that’s why my brain liked it.