Oh, hi, Ohio

Summer in Ohio is sticky, heavy. The sky hangs low and sulking clouds blanket the sky. Somewhere down the road, a truck starts, grumbles, crunches down the gravel driveway and then wails down into Sonnenburg valley. A train whistles down at the station, and winds its way through the settling fog after the evening’s rain. The roads were steaming at sunset. The moon is nearly full tonight, but silvery clouds tease in front of the moon’s cratered face, and the night is still and dark.

I’m lonely, I think. Small towns are funny like that—although the waitresses down at the Kidron Town and Country store know my order even before I’ve slipped onto the bar stool, and the police officers know me by name and wave as I speed past, and the local paper publishes write-ups about my adventures abroad, I feel distant, alone. My return home causes a stir. I can see it rippling through concerned faces as neighbors, or teachers, or old friends ask with consternation: “Are ya thinking ‘bout moving over there to Paris for good?” (Paris, in the opinion of small town America, is synonymous to the entire country of France, by the way.)

I myself was a relatively compliant small town American, in my day. I marched in the marching band and thus faithfully attended four solid years of high school football games, and I knew all the words to the fight song. I sang in the choir and sat second chair in the flute section in concert band and I held roles in the spring musicals. I destroyed my body (with all the school spirit in the world) in my 11.5 months a year of training for cross-country, and more importantly, for pole vault. I spoke kindly and even fondly of Dalton High School in my valedictorian speech, and I threw my graduation cap with cheers and tears after a heartfelt singing of the alma mater with my classmates and peers. But I was not happy.

In France, in 2009, I was riding in the backseat of my friend Levy’s car. I was squashed in between Katie and Shawna, two of my best American friends, and Laurent and Levy were up front, singing to the radio and flying down the road. We were on our way to Apt, where were going to spend the night before heading to Mediterranean the next day for an afternoon at the beach. As we wound through Les Alpilles mountains, the sun was setting, and I found myself suddenly smiling, for absolutely no reason. The grin felt foreign on my face. With a start, I realized that I was content, happy even. I had forgotten what it felt like.

I tell this story often. It’s a bit silly, perhaps even sappy, but it’s the only way I have to explain what it’s like to cross that Atlantic Ocean and arrive in a place that inexplicably feels like home. After years of depression, anxiety, panic attacks, anger, bitterness, and the lethargic but encumbering weight of dysthymia, I found myself smiling in the backseat of a car, zooming across a country bathed in the colors of a Cezanne painting. It’s a powerful and singular sensation.

The night before I left the de Lannoy house, Constance wept and wept and wept. She clung onto my waist and gripped my fingers and trembled. At 6:50 the next morning, after an estimated 2 hours of fitful sleep, Eric and Godefoy stood sniffling on the platform as my train screeched and puffed and whisked me away. Eric had made Godefoy, his best friend from childhood, accompany him to the train station because he wasn’t sure he would be able to drive home alone without his beloved Rachel, l’américaine adorable.

On the train, I shamelessly wept. As the world was waking up, I was traveling backwards, facing south while the train swept me north. I watched the sun rise over Mont Ventoux, but as we hurtled past, the mountain itself shrunk into the horizon. Distance melted the mightiest peak. Speed strung landscape after landscape onto a moving reel to a soundtrack of grinding wheels. I wanted to sleep, to let the train cradle me into a slumber of homesick exhaustion, but I was afraid to close my eyes, to let the countryside slip through my fingers while I selfishly slept.

I have fallen in love with a country, like one falls in love with a man or a woman. I want to feel the curves of her mountains beneath my palms, I want to nestle my nose in her waving tresses of lavender, I want to rest my head in the bosom of her fragrant earth. My heart aches for the gentle caresses of her salty, Mediterranean shores, and for the sweet tongue of her language, dripping in honey and romance. She is a feisty lover—when she is angry, the Mistral shrieks outside of windows and slams shutters and shatters glass. But eventually she’ll blow herself out, and smug and satisfied, she’ll settle back into her complacent calm. Her hot summer days melt in golden hues into sultry nights, and to a symphony of cicadas, I allow myself to be seduced.

It’s been cloudy in Ohio since my return, and uncharacteristically chilly, although the stifling humidity hasn’t lifted despite the mild temperatures. Not much has changed here. My room was how I left it, although the posters are a bit more faded and my bookshelf sags a bit more under the weight of its dusty books. My parents have been doing their best to make me feel comfortable and at home; they’ll let me talk when I need to, and they’ll let me sit in silence and stare at the cornfield in our backyard when I need to. We had wine with dinner tonight—a somewhat fruity chardonnay from the Languedoc-Roussillon region that had been bottled in California and put in the “French wine” section at the supermarket. My mom let me by Brie from the specialty foods aisle at the grocery store yesterday, although I was disappointed by it. It was bland. In an attempt to emulate my morning coffee in France, I ordered a double espresso at a coffee shop a few days ago. When the barista tried to put it in a Styrofoam cup, I loudly protested and refused to accept it until a more suitable cup had been found. French wine is not bottled in California, Brie is anything but bland, and espresso certainly does not belong in a Styrofoam cup, goddamnit.

I’ve been trying to make the most of my loneliness in Ohio before I’m cast back into the roaring river of academia and swept away by my studies. I am appreciative of the fact that for dinner, I can go out to my garden and pick a zucchini, some tomatoes, and a pepper or two, and stop by the produce stand by the Dalton Dariette to buy a melon from an Amish neighbor named Henry. It’s comforting to know that my eggs come from my neighbor Glen’s chickens, and that my sweet corn is of none other than the Witmer variety. Under the full moon last night, Jared and I climbed to the top of the Witmer silo and sat and watched the clouds dance in front of the moon, and looked out over the farm where we’ve both spent so many summers picking corn. Tonight, as I write, I can hear the cowbells down from the Neuenschwander’s pastures and sounds of crickets and owls fill the dark void outside my window.

I come from a special place, I must admit. The valley in the morning, when rolling clouds of heavy fog lumber across Sugar Creek and the dawn light glistens on dewy cattails, truly is beautiful. However, nestled in my sheets that smell like clover from having been hung out on the line to dry, I’m still not at home. The Atlantic Ocean bellows between.

One day, I’ll go back. Et jusqu’à là, au revoir.