Prairie State Perspective (refreshed)

A 10-day weekend for Thanksgiving. It looks like a lot when I see it in type, really.

I don't have class on Fridays and my cohort is given a free "no questions asked" walk on our Tuesday class to use at our discretion. Add to that a heart-felt phone call to the professor of my Monday class explaining how my mother bought an extra ticket to see the national tour of Wicked on the 18th in St Louis on the off-chance that yours truly would be able to attend with her, you see how I got this wondrous block of days to vacate my everyday circumstances.

I took a morning flight out of Dallas into St. Louis. I had about 7 hours to waste, so I took the Metrolink downtown, found a Starbucks and camped out. Hence the previous caffeine-laced post. However, I was surprised at how nervous I was to be coming home.

You see, there's this certain phenomenon that takes place when anyone who has any semblance of a life somewhere, "goes home." I'll try to explain.

In Waco, I am a respected -okay semi-respected- Graduate Assistant with Baylor Student Athlete Services. It's a tough job and not for the faint of heart. I'm constantly walking the line between being "cool": understanding the lingo, knowing when to laugh, being able to jab and cut with my own lines, being able to be funny. And sometimes I have to be "hard": sniffing out lies, disciplining, kicking athletes out, writing reports to coaches, etc. I think I do a very good job.

And then there's Graduate school. In my classes, being surrounded by very smart and intelligent people driven in earnest pursuit of knowledge insists I stay on my toes. I have professors who push me and a mentor that kicks me and friends that challenge me.

So how is it then, if I am so grown-up, that the very moment I pass the "Hamilton: Pop. 3,300" sign, I cease to be Neil Golemo, Future Student Services Professional and am once again, Neil Golemo, Gregg and Milly's kid, the one who's throw up in the fake potted plant outside the Nurse's office? (Not once, but twice)

This phenomenon truly fascinates me. How is it that I can go from waxing intellectual about what Bonhoefer would say about the debt-load of the average college graduate to having a wet-willy war with my little sister? (she's 20 years old, but in my mind she'll always be 6 years-old and wearing her first-communion dress) I'll say this much. Its fun... for the most part. Oh and for the record, I think 'ol Dietrich would have been "against it."

There was a time where I couldn't wait to leave a Hamilton. I hated it. It was killing me. It was, as Myles told me the first time we ever conversed, "the kudzu around my legs." And believe-you-me, I needed to leave. Leaving Hamilton/Illinois was perhaps the best/ballsy-est thing I've ever done for myself; it was good for me in so many ways. It was a cooling bath of water that hardened me.

I've grown up so much since then. My friends I've made at Baylor are the best I've ever had. (I can just hear every one of them yelling "FAG!" over my shoulder) I am not Gregg and Milly's son. I am not Neil Golemo, super-Christian, holier than thou, didn't drink all through high school, National Merit Scholar, perfect person (vomit). I am not the "miracle child" of whom so much is expected. I can just be Neil, here. I got a clean start.

Despite my relapses, I am not the same Neil I used to be. -Okay, so maybe I didn't toss my childish ways quite far enough. I might not have thrown them, but at least I've loosened my strangle-grip on them. And being away has done that for me. It's let me escape the unchanging definition of me that so makes people feel safe.

But you know, now it feels as though coming back to Illinois might be yet another stage in who I am. In a strange way, we really don't ever change. We just grow. A tree still has its innermost rings and I will always be "Gregg and Milly's boy." And to some, I will always be remembered for the places in which I've retched... But I think that's a good thing. We can never be here without first having been there. As much as I'd like to pretend to be all branches and leaves, I can't forget that I have my roots. It does me good to remember that.

It's sorta like Monet's glance from the canvas back to the actual haystacks. I'm still a work in progress, but its the perspective that can allow me to be a masterpiece. Here's to my own personal Renaissance