smell the tile
there was this one spot on campus, before the construction was done on the gaylord building... the spot was right on asp, after you'd just passed gould hall... and the gravel and the sun and the heat and the sounds and the fence... everything about that spot instantly would send me back to the streets of nazareth for just a few moments... and once my brained gooed back into reality, i realized... nope, i'm just in norman...
sometimes i can smell the wind or feel the entire environment by looking at a picture... or hearing a familiar sound... i can smell the tiles... see the furniture... feel the cold stone handrail i always sat on...
i was talking to my big sister today on the phone, who is in israel, in nazareth, for my cousin's wedding. i heard someone walk across the tile at my grandmas house and i was instantly transferred to her living room... we usually would go together, but you know... being kicked out of school isn't always efficient... so... i'm trying to avoid it this time.
so... whats the point of this post? or do i really think you care what nazareth smells like? i just think it's incredible that you can have a certain image... no... aura... about a place of your childhood, and as you age and return... you expect the place to be the same... you expect your cousins to still all be like--6 years old-- you expect the streets and shopkeepers and houses to all be the same... and sometimes they are and sometimes they aren't... there are things about nazareth that will always be the same-- but there are things about nazareth that have changed quite a lot... its fairly gross i hear. funny-- everyone thinks of it as this incredibly holy city, and i'm here telling you that its fairly gross. its much dirtier now... all the beautiful places we used to play aren't there anymore, they've all been turned into parking lots. those damn roosters and chickens that used to keep me up for hours are prolly all gone. my paternal grandparents house has morphed into a modern nightmare. but among all the changes... one thing hasn't changed. smell the tile... it smells the same.
yeah, i'm sad i didn't go this year, but look at it this way... with all the hummers around... it feels more and more like israel every day. ;)
sometimes i can smell the wind or feel the entire environment by looking at a picture... or hearing a familiar sound... i can smell the tiles... see the furniture... feel the cold stone handrail i always sat on...
i was talking to my big sister today on the phone, who is in israel, in nazareth, for my cousin's wedding. i heard someone walk across the tile at my grandmas house and i was instantly transferred to her living room... we usually would go together, but you know... being kicked out of school isn't always efficient... so... i'm trying to avoid it this time.
so... whats the point of this post? or do i really think you care what nazareth smells like? i just think it's incredible that you can have a certain image... no... aura... about a place of your childhood, and as you age and return... you expect the place to be the same... you expect your cousins to still all be like--6 years old-- you expect the streets and shopkeepers and houses to all be the same... and sometimes they are and sometimes they aren't... there are things about nazareth that will always be the same-- but there are things about nazareth that have changed quite a lot... its fairly gross i hear. funny-- everyone thinks of it as this incredibly holy city, and i'm here telling you that its fairly gross. its much dirtier now... all the beautiful places we used to play aren't there anymore, they've all been turned into parking lots. those damn roosters and chickens that used to keep me up for hours are prolly all gone. my paternal grandparents house has morphed into a modern nightmare. but among all the changes... one thing hasn't changed. smell the tile... it smells the same.
yeah, i'm sad i didn't go this year, but look at it this way... with all the hummers around... it feels more and more like israel every day. ;)
posted by bitterhoney at 10:11 PM
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