you can't go home

I went back to my hometown this weekend for their centennial celebration. Yes, that's right--Polk, NE turns 100 this year.

For those of you who are from small towns (especially if they happen to be in the general vicinity of central Nebraska) might have an idea of how the event went down. First, there was a tiny little parade down Main Street (all two blocks of it), then beans and ice cream in the park (at the end of Main Street) and a vintage car show at the elementary school (on the other side of the park). In the evening, the part of Main Street outside the town bar was closed off and there was a beer garden and street dance with some little cover band out of Grand Island (I don't remember the name). I went for the early afternoon and wandered around with my family, then hit the beer garden and hoped for some people I knew.

Luckily enough (I guess), there was a pretty good showing of the younger crowd; only a couple from my class directly, but a few from the classes around me. Now, in high school, I never really liked the people in the classes around me. Sadly--but not too surprisingly--few of them seemed to have changed much.

I can't really believe that, though; I feel like I've changed a great deal in the last five years, and any of the classmates I kept in touch with have as well. I think what happens in those cases is that going back to Polk also means going back to who you were then. People fell back into their old roles, cracked the same sorts of jokes with their old buddies; if we hadn't done that, it would have been awkward. None of us really knew each other any more, we only knew the old versions and tried our best to apply them to these otherwise new people (hell, almost none of my high school buddies had ever seen me drink before). It was kind of depressing; here we all are, back from five years of adult life, and we were trying to bring back something that most of us had easily given up on graduation day.

Still, it wasn't all depressing. After the beer garden closed, we took off for the pasture surrounding a buddy's pond with some Busch Light for a good old-fashioned bonfire. I spent most of the night avoiding the other guests and staring at the sky (Lincoln's got nothing for stars, let me assure you) but after the bulk of the party left, it was down to myself and two of the guys with whom I graduated. We stood around talking about life and watching the bonfire go out until the sun came up and we figured it was probably time to go home.

I always felt constrained in Polk; for that matter, I feel a bit constrained in Lincoln. I think it's very unlikely that I'll even go back for my 10-year reunion. So, I think Saturday night might be my last pasture party, my last Busch Light bonfire; I never really enjoyed them anyway.

But I can't help but be a little sad.