{"id":46295,"date":"2018-11-27T04:00:10","date_gmt":"2018-11-27T04:00:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tumblr.scrollofthoth.com\/index.php\/2018\/11\/27\/gotta-get-back-to-where-im-from\/"},"modified":"2018-11-27T04:00:10","modified_gmt":"2018-11-27T04:00:10","slug":"gotta-get-back-to-where-im-from","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/tumblr.scrollofthoth.com\/index.php\/2018\/11\/27\/gotta-get-back-to-where-im-from\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cGotta get back to where I\u2019m from\u2026.\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

emergentanimism<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n
<\/figure>\n

Change of plans. Probably best that my local spirit shrine
\nwait until the spring anyway. My amazing wife came up with a better idea.<\/p>\n

I was born in the suburbs of Chicago, but Michigan will
\nalways be home to me. When I was a kid we had two homes. No, we weren\u2019t rich,
\nper-se. We were certainly better off than a lot of people, but it was a
\ntestament to the power of solidarity that at one time the American middle-class
\ncould afford a summer home. My grandmother, who came over from Poland as a
\nlittle girl, worked for thirty years at General Foods in Chicago. No college
\ndegree, a woman alone in the workforce, but they had a union. The union
\ndemanded that the workers got as much of their fair share as possible. Can you
\nimagine? I\u2019m glad for the advances in civil rights this country has made, but
\nracism and sexism are still rampant, and we have lost so much in terms of
\nworker rights. But I digress.<\/p>\n

Our second home was in a place called Sister Lakes. I still
\ndream about it. Those endless summers spent swimming in the lake. I never knew
\nhow lucky I was.<\/p>\n

<\/figure>\n

But my grandmother, a woman who based her identity on work,
\ndied shortly after her retirement. With the pension gone, my mom worked three
\njobs to try and keep what we had. A losing battle. She wore herself down to a
\nnub. Unable to work anymore, she sold the house in Illinois and retired to our
\nhome in Michigan.<\/p>\n

I resented it so much at the time. Moving from the city,
\nafter going to one of the largest high schools in the state of Illinois, to a
\nhigh school with only three-hundred students. That was a culture shock. I\u2019m
\nglad for it now, because I can see both perspectives. I know why people in
\nrural areas think the way they do and I appreciate the more cosmopolitan attitude
\nof the city. I can talk to people with different backgrounds and relate to
\ntheir struggles.<\/p>\n

I ended up living in Michigan for twenty years, most of it
\nin Kalamazoo. Even that far inland, one thing, one power, one spirit remained a
\nconstant\u2014Lake Michigan. I imagine people who live near an ocean understand what
\nI mean. You seldom look at it, don\u2019t even know it when you\u2019re under its domain,
\nbut you feel it. It has gravity. It effects the weather and the seasons and the
\nair you breathe. Only the gods themselves rival its power and influence.<\/p>\n

<\/figure>\n

A strange thing happened when I moved to Indianapolis a
\ndecade ago. I was never a navigator and always had a piss-poor sense of
\ndirection. But as soon as I moved to Indianapolis, I always knew which way was
\nNorth. I could feel the gravity. My blood called out to it. I soon realized
\nthat I always had a sense which way Lake Michigan lies.<\/p>\n

Maybe I\u2019m too big for my britches. Maybe I shouldn\u2019t be
\ntrying to build a relationship with a spirit so powerful right now. Yet I feel like
\nthe Lake is family. One of my ancestors. My grandmother bought that house
\nbecause all of her friends and family bought houses in Michigan if they
\ncould. So maybe it is family. Maybe this is the bridge for me, the link between
\nancestor veneration and the spirits of the land.<\/p>\n

Next Sunday, my wife and I will drive to Lake Michigan and
\nbottle up some of that water so we always have it near. There will be a ritual.
\nI don\u2019t know what it will be yet. All I know is that as I sit here and write this,
\ntears flowing down my face, is that I want to go home.<\/p>\n

<\/figure>\n

\u201cI was born in Chicago, but I go home to\u2026.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

emergentanimism: Change of plans. Probably best that my local spirit shrine wait until the spring anyway. My amazing wife came up with a better idea. I was born in the suburbs of Chicago, but Michigan will always be home to me. When I was a kid we had two homes. No, we weren\u2019t rich, per-se. … Continue reading “\u201cGotta get back to where I\u2019m from\u2026.\u201d”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-46295","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/tumblr.scrollofthoth.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46295","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/tumblr.scrollofthoth.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/tumblr.scrollofthoth.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tumblr.scrollofthoth.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tumblr.scrollofthoth.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46295"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/tumblr.scrollofthoth.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46295\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/tumblr.scrollofthoth.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46295"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tumblr.scrollofthoth.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46295"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tumblr.scrollofthoth.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46295"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}