CROSSING THE BORDER

It’s still five days away but already my mind is in Texas. It’s not about longing. No, the Lone Star State looms. 

 

Texas is a Red State with a lot of personal history. I lived there for eleven years, from tenth grade through university and four years of teaching. But I left thirty-six years ago. I headed to L.A.—Malibu, specifically—and thought I’d never look back. 

 

Well, not exactly. That’s personal history rewriting itself. My years at Texas Christian University in Fort Worth had been particularly good times. I left Texas but many of those friends didn’t. At least, not at first. Back when George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton were presidents, I’d make an annual trip to see friends and family. Politics had no bearing on travel decisions within the U.S. 

 

My, how that’s changed…

 

As far as I can recall, I’ve only returned twice in the last fifteen years, once for my parents’ fiftieth wedding anniversary, the other time for my niece’s wedding. (My niece now lives in Colorado.) 

 

Yes, my parents still live there. I sound like a heel since I haven’t visited. They’ve been living in a condominium for many years and I’ve never seen it. (My mother reminds me of this often.) But I do see my parents. I used to anyway. We would see each other every summer at the family cottage in Ontario. A few times I saw them at my sister’s place in Colorado. They’ve come to Vancouver as well, often connected with one of the many cruises my father loves to plan. 

 

For the past two summers, my parents have not gone to the cottage. They’ve said they won’t be going anymore. Navigating airports and flying have become too much for them. They’re not driving to Colorado either since the higher altitude negatively impacts both of them. And so, In 2024, I visited them in Gulf Shores, Alabama where they drive to spend a month each fall. It wasn’t so bad. I walked the beach, I biked a marshy area, I wrote by myself in a café. No politics. (Headphones can be glorious.) I don’t remember what the news of the day was but it was two weeks after twice-impeached Trump was elected president once again. (WTF?) My parents’ candidate had won so they probably felt like victors, too. Why rub their son’s face in it? (We’re not that kind of family.) I watched morning news with my parents. Safer viewing. More talk about the weather than anything else. I tracked down a New York Times while my parents read The Wall Street Journal. Politically, we coexisted without any two-track debates where our arguments never converge. This news-related ceasefire was a rarity for us.

 

But now it’s a much belated return to East Texas, the city of Tyler, two hours from Dallas, forty-five minutes from where I went to high school. 

 

East Texas.

 

This is a central hub for Red State thinking. This is the state that wants to put up the ten commandments in every classroom, for god’s sake. This is a state that smiles smugly as it proudly busses and flies immigrants to New York. It’s not an anti-gay, anti-trans leader like, say, Florida, but you can bet they’re on that bandwagon. I do everything I can to block from my mind whatever it is that Texas does politically. I don’t need the agitation or the aggravation. 

It would be easier to visit if my parents weren’t such news junkies. News is on morning and night. There are two newspapers delivered each day. My father comments on many of the news items, his opinions highly skewed. I hope to read, write or time my exercises with some of the newscasts. Anything to minimize the chances of an argument. As it is across the entire country, no one is going to change anyone’s mind in my parent’s household. All I have to do is shut up, even regarding topics about which I care deeply.

 

Repeat: No one is going to change anyone’s mind. 

 

Quite frankly, the news scares me. I don’t want to hear what’s being said on Fox News, nor do I want to hear what Texans are telling Texans. I don’t want to have a better understanding of what books are being banned, what anti-gay and/or anti-trans bills are before the state legislature or have recently been enacted. I don’t want to hear the political banter when I write at the café my mother tells me she thinks I’ll like. 

 

Must. Wear. Headphones.

 

In between newscasts and football games (which I also can’t bring myself to watch), let there be times to chat and connect. Let there be an occasion when I can hop in my rental car, drive to a state park and walk among the pine trees where the flora has no political opinions whatsoever. Let me get through this trip, family ties intact.  

WAIST-DEEP

April marks a year since I’ve moved from my home and into a teensy, still empty condo in Downtown Vancouver. Based on my experiences following past moves, it takes about two years to feel settled and to establish social connections. I’m beyond the point of getting my feet wet; I suppose I’m waist-deep.

It is true that I lived in Vancouver for ten years before moving to the Land of Nowhere, but there was another ten year gap before I moved back. As well, more than seven of my years during Round 1 Vancouver were spent with my ex and friendships faded as time with him took over.

When I began Round 2, I naively thought old friendships would blossom anew. I was, after all, excited to reconnect. We’d had good times. Now I was free and in closer proximity to pick up where we left off.

But things don’t work that way. I’m not that special. The world doesn’t wait. I’m reminded of this every day as I see the condo building across the street from me and I know that one of my closest friends from the ‘90s lives there with his partner. I see them, always together, about once every six weeks as I head off to the gym or return from a run and they are out walking their two bulldogs. The first exchange lasted about five minutes. Now we’re down to “Hello.”

So, yes, this is starting all over again. This would have been clearer and less ego-crushing had I moved somewhere completely new. Winnipeg. But having driven through that city several times and never stopping longer than to grab a coffee, I have no yearning to settle in the place that’s not so lovingly referred to as Winterpeg by many Canadians. There were a few places I’d have gladly have moved to. Los Angeles. Seattle. Portland. And, after a visit last summer, maybe Minneapolis. It comes as a surprise after living in the U.S. for sixteen years and all the while yearning to return to Canada that I realize I fit in better in the States. Yes, I know it is the land of Trump and I hear about people swearing they’ll move to Canada if Hillary or The Donald gets elected. I’m used to partisan politics and all that is broken and yet I still want to move there. Surely that’s the immigration test, isn’t it? Maybe we can do an exchange. But seriously, the application I sent six years ago, sponsored by my American parents, remains somewhere in what has to be the mother of all backlogs.  I’ve let that American dream go.

All that said, Vancouver is home. It almost sounds like it is so by default. Sorry about that, dear city. It’s breathtakingly beautiful here. In fact, after jogging along the Thames in March, I couldn’t help but feel pride and renewed appreciation for how gorgeous Vancouver’s seawall is. I love to jog it, bike it, walk it. I’m geeky about mass transit and Vancouver’s is decent, even if it comes nowhere near the efficiency of London’s system and even though there was the overwhelming smell of urine where I sat at the back of the bus. It’s an urban thing. The arts scene here is weak. I see flashes of hope though. Nothing to rival New York or Toronto, not even Minneapolis, but I can find a few exhibits and performances to attend over the course of a year. It’s something.

I’m realizing that the few friends I have reconnected with are routine-oriented. Maybe people get that way as they get older. Unfortunately, I’m terrible about planning ahead—I see it as being spontaneous—and so, by the time I get around to thinking about the weekend, it’s, well, Saturday afternoon. When I texted a friend about getting together, she suggested the last Sunday in May.

Wow. This is hard.

In the past, I’ve made friends through school and work but I’m finally done with academia and my work remains back in that rural area. Teachers don’t socialize with the principal. The go-tos of the past went away.

I signed up for the gay volleyball league. Unfortunately, I dislocated my pinky finger on the third night and it’s still not right. More physio and a prognosis that I’ll never play volleyball again. Sorry ‘bout that, Team Canada. Carry on that bid in Rio without me.

I’ve attended the gay running group three or four times but I haven’t made inroads and I wind up running alone. I’ll give it another go. Someday. The fact is that I’m an extreme introvert, very reserved, painfully shy. When a social group initially feels closed, I pass the time retying my shoelaces, petting a dog or just slipping away. Yes, indeed, this is hard.

I can do better. I moved back to Vancouver for more than solo jogs on the seawall. I still have another year to finally get back on course. Let me start trying to make something of next weekend tonight. Or I can at least firm things up for that Sunday in May. It’s a (re)start.