As part of my preparation for Georgia, I made my way on down to the Durham Convention Center and Visitors’ Bureau — a place that I had never visited, never having been a visitor to Durham myself. I picked up a bunch of brochures, magazines, maps, etc., all to show the Georgians that I will meet what my hometown and home state are like. Luckily enough, I strayed away from the free stuff and over into the area with the postcards and mugs and such.
Postcards have a way of making places look very cool — cooler, often, than the places actually are. It was funny for me to look at the postcards of Durham, pictures of things that I consider to be so normal, such a part of life and what I see on a daily basis, to see those things in shiny, colorful prints that people supposedly send to one another. On the bottom of every card, it has a slogan — “Durham, where great things happen.”
Now, I love Durham. Especially now that I’ve left and come back, and now that I’m 21 and can take advantage of everything that it has to offer. And it has a lot to offer, especially with all the upgrades downtown that have happened just in the last five years or so. There’s plenty to do, and it all has this really wonderful local character — most of the people who choose to live in Durham do so because they love it, and there’s a lot to love.
Living in the same town where I grew up has its obvious disadvantages, which are, to me, enough to send me across the ocean to a country that probably a majority of Americans don’t know exists. But there are great things about it too, and I’ll miss those. It’s a city, but a small one, small enough that if you go to the same places often enough you see the same people, you recognize them, and you can count on seeing people from different parts of your life wherever you go. The other day I met an old friend for coffee, someone I hadn’t seen in literally eight years, and when I was waiting for him I ran into my rabbi, who I also hadn’t seen in forever. It was really lovely, to have memories thrown into my path like that.
I know that where I’m not going, I won’t have that. I won’t see people on the street who I know I recognize from somewhere without being able to place them, I won’t be able to point out my elementary school on the left and my favorite restaurant on the next block, I won’t be able to cruise down the road that leads to my high school or run into people from different stages of my life anywhere. What I’m leaving, quite willingly, is a community. But that doesn’t mean I won’t miss it.
I suppose the task now is for me to build a new one, or, rather, make myself a part of an existing one. And that’s something I’m really excited about — everything is going to be so new, the culture, the language, the people, the whole situation. I’m ready to love it. But as I wonder what great things those marketing agents are talking about and what new things will happen in Durham after I leave, I know that I’ll miss what I’ve got now.
Expat Bound 