"Sad to be all alone in the world?" - Thoroughly Modern Millie

This is my last post of 2007, though it is January 1, 2008. I'll try and post-date it, but I suspect software will get in my way. There is a transition time on New Year's Day where it's not the new year yet and it's fair to continue with the thoughts and bad habits of the old. At least that's what my hangover is telling me. 

I took this picture late on the dying edge of a party at Matthew and Heather's. Matthew was shortening our lives by spraying toxic artificial snow on this little tree that he found in a bin on the edge of the big Happy Valley cemeteries. It was there in the trash with the stand, the water holder and all. 

I'm including it in this post because it reminds me of a conversation I had at that party with Heather and a guy who's lived away from San Francisco for 20 years. We were talking of home towns and what it means to be from somewhere. If you've lived abroad, you know the conversation: It starts with the question where are you from? Then it wanders through whether that's an easy or difficult question, touches on what other expats say, ventures toward what your own expat kids say as their answer and compares that to the answers of everyone in the conversation.  Then it inevitably moves toward how if someone hasn't lived abroad, this conversation doesn't have any meaning. I don't mean to say that I'm by any means tired of this topic - it's constantly fascinating to hear how people are dealing with the feelings that come with this rootless life. And it's a bonding conversation that works to remind how much we have in common.  

But this time we started talking about the long epistles sent home. Heather said that in her first year in Korea, she took pictures all the time and sent home e-mails every time she went anywhere. Gradually the letters became less frequent, though, as she realized that nobody was reading them. Until now, on her third country, she only writes about her travels because her grandma posts them up in the old folks home, proud of her granddaughter's adventures. The other guy agreed. He told how he had taken his family on this incredible trekking adventure in Nepal - really one of the best trips of his life. In the summer back home, a family member asked him what he'd been up to. He started to tell about the trip only to be interrupted in a few minutes by, "We got a new dryer last week." They both said that no one wants to read these letters and descriptions because no one can understand a life that is different from their own, and no one wants to. 

That's such a sad thought that it belongs in 2007, not 2008. I hope they are wrong. I hope I'm not just talking to myself.