Into the Ring of Fire

Heading off to the Old City in a week or so.  This won't be Scandinavia, that's for sure.  I'm wondering if this will be my last trip back for a while?  I've said this many times but I may finally mean it.  I sent a big note to my sister discussing a variety of weighty matters - which took me quite a while to put together, included a few revisions and rewrites, and caused me some mental anguish - and 3 days later I get nothing back.  

Dad is dad - uncommunicative, angry, discontented.  He's doing dad things - I suspect that when I'm there that he appreciates it more than I know but . . . it's not as if I'm doing anything to make his life better.  He doesn't want to talk.  Really - he's always been a pretty selfish man.  He did a decent job of handling family responsibilities, setting a decent religious example, but not a lot more than that.  And my sister and I have never been close - never been remotely close - so this behavior is very consistent on her part.  Am I not the guy who prides himself on behaving consistently?  That's all I can ask of someone else - do the best that you can and behave in a consistent manner.  That way I know what to expect and can adjust my expectations accordingly.

I'll see a few friends and I'll leave some more alone - I do myself a disservice if I make it a priority to see them.  If I leave it all be then they become people who are simply dear old friends that I love a lot who live far away.  I can hardly get upset - if I want to be reasonable about it and I do not - with people that I never spoke with on the phone when I lived there or with people that I made uncomfortable when I gave it a shot.  Some of us don't like the phone.  Or texting.  Or email.  

Maybe I'll take a few drives through downtown; see the house, recently sold, that was in the family for 55 years; check out my old neighborhoods; then call it quits.  Go back when someone dies.  It isn't like people are pounding on my door to stay in touch - and this is the exception rather than the rule, so whose fault is that?  Go find a mirror.  I'm the dude who fled.  If I wanted things to stay the same then I should have stayed put.