…where the heart is

I get homesick randomly. Two days ago in the grocery store there were perfectly ripe plums for sale. I don’t like plums but my mom does, and the smell of them like that reminded me of her instantly. It took me back to any number of cross-country car rides my family took while I was growing up. And since dad didn’t believe in stopping for food we always had an ice chest full of tuna salad to last a lifetime (YUCK), boiled eggs, and fruit. Apples, grapes…plums.

So I was a little homesick for a moment. Struck by a mental picture of my mom.

When I was climbing Franz Josef glacier my thoughts were to my dad. He loves that kind of stuff…and of all the nature stuff he knows I’m not sure what he knows about glaciers. But I think he would have enjoyed it. So in that way, he was with me in the south island.

And then of course there are family outings. Even though I know they won’t stop having them because I’m not there to participate, I always have a bit of a sting…a surge of love and melancholy when I hear about all the family stuff I’m missing out. Today is my sister’s birthday and so this weekend the family went out to the fair.

I can see it in my minds eye…my sister excited to show the girls new things, my dad cracking silly jokes, my mom stopping at art booths, ced commenting on food. And me…here reading about it.

My time here is quickly receding into a handful of weeks. And while I’ve come to love many aspects of my life here in New Zealand enough to make my departure sad, I will be happy to get hug my nieces (who may not remember me), talk to my parents without thought of phone bills, eat my brother in law’s cooking, and play scrabble with my sister…ordinary things, family things…our things…neglected too long.

it occured to me as i sat in an auditorium below the library 40 minutes before 7, people getting bossy about seats, that it was a different kind of fun. i wasn’t waiting for prince to make an appearance, or even the prime minister. instead i was staking out a seat so i could see jared diamond, author of guns, germs and steel.

and i wasn’t alone…the main room had overflow into several other rooms and eventually even the overflow rooms had overflow. i don’t know if i’m excited or bummed that i’m not a special kind of geek in the city.

most noticeable tonight (since sadly the talk was just a recapping of the book and i’ve already read it) was the reality that i was one of only two brown faces in a sea of a couple hundred people…and a funny thing jared said…

someone asked a rather leading question about the work ethic of europeans as the result of having to live in cold climates. jared broke it down to the notion that northeast europe contributed no innovations to the world until the water wheele.

it was a funny moment but i guess you had to be there.

spring in auckland is abrilliant sight and an assault on the sinuses.

it is easy to forget how much green new zealand is when living in the heart of the capital. even though it is surrounded by water and building are nestled into hills, the amount of plant life is limited by all the concrete and steel.

but out in the suburbs, where the tall buildings taper off and houses emerge on haphazard plots the foliage springs to life. pink magnolia trees blossom pink on leafless branches. everywhere flowers spring from unlikely places. vines running along iron fences, petals from bushes that look they would never flower, and anything living in soil.

i’ve been told that this is just the beginning. that when spring really comes it will explode – folowers so heavy they bend branches. and then seemingly moments later, a stiff wind or a heavey rain washes the buds away paving the way for summer.

Staring out of the window at work today I watched three guys pose in various positions -inside a trashcan, halfway up a light pole – to have their picture taken. After each flash they would crowd around the cameraman and gaze at the pixelated version of themselves gracing the back of the digital camera. What came to mind was a “study” (I use the term loosely these days) that was comparing the generations…generations Y and X, boomers and so on.

Their focus was on the immediacy that drives gen Ys (those 20 somethings). it talked bout a generation raised on CDs so they never had to bother with even fast forwarding, cell phones so they didn’t have to wait till they got home to call, email so they didn’t have to wait for snail mail…and staring at these three guys I think of cameras where you don’t have to wait the lone hour it takes to get them printed these days (while my folks had to wait more than a week back in their day!).

And I’m guilty of it too…wondering why the heck someone isn’t answering their cell phone despite my personal philosophy being, “if I wanted you with me I would have invited you (tongue in cheek of course)”.

And in some ways it doesn’t matter if it is good or useful or even counter productive given that, well…it is what it is. Still I remember the anticipation of waiting for pictures to be printed…the disappointment of a missed shot…the unexpected joy of a moment I captured without realizing.

The other day I burned a CD for S. a friend and I mused that the skill and art of it was diminished when you no longer have to gauge how many songs will fit and how much space to put before and after. the program I burn my CDs thinks through that for me. All I do now is order the songs so they make some kind of sense. Now, what used to be a labour of love is amazingly easy.

Don’t get me wrong…I love faster and smaller for most things. I adore blogging and email, mp3 players that fit into my back pocket with some 700 songs nestled all tiny within. At the same time…I miss conversations that are not interrupted by a txt msg ringing its way through. I miss photos that surprise me because I forgot I’d taken that particular one. And I still appreciate the rare and exquisite pleasure of a letter, hand written and handled, greeting me from my mailbox. There is something human in it…like a hug from an old friend, both reassuring and tangible.