It’s 12:30 and I’m wide awake. Wide.

I am home. I cannot sleep. I am home … Home.

It feels strange, foreign. Yet still, home. How can it not? This is the place I grew up, lived my first 22 {one month shy of 23} years. That is a long time.

Every street, every sign, every stoplight, every building — it all holds a meaning and a memory to me. I am overwhelmed, assaulted with memories.

Freddie Mac HQ where I interned one summer and spent a couple drunk nights breaking into. Before anyone freaks out on me, I didn’t really break in.

But yeah, going to your place of employment under the influence at 2a.m. with random people you’ve just met? Probably not the best idea. Doubtless, the guys who viewed the security camera footage were entertained. Multiple times.

Or, the time on Route 7 one night, as I was the only sober one in the car, and obviously, designated driver, desperately had to pee. I was never going to make it home with that many drunks being as annoying as drunks can get.

I pulled over, and peed off, well partly on, Route 7. I know, talk about some class. A cop actually pulled up behind me and was sure I was drunk. How embarrassing. He almost saw my ass and I was nothing short of mortified.

Then there’s the Mobil gas station where I sat and cried one spring night my junior year in high school, my best friend in the car with me, over some lamo {but very cute} college boy. Once my brothers went off to college, I was all – forget high school boys. They’re no fun! It’s time for some real men.

These are the memories and the moments that have been captured, that are held here. Representing so much more than just a gas station or even a toll plaza.

And it’s like these damn memories become a terror squad, I mean, firing squad. Well, terror, too. Banging away at me. Honestly, I’m not quite sure how to handle them all at once. Each one its own bullet, paining me, yet with such sweet fondness, at the same time.

Part of me wants to burst into uncontrollable tears. A combination of mourning and joy. Can you understand that? That I’m not sad for what was, oh no … far from it. But yes, there is a certain sadness in what was my life — my entire life — that now no longer is.

It’s a different Taurus who lived here. Yet I am met face to face with her ghost when I am here.

I know this is life, the natural change and progression of things. And I wouldn’t have wanted to stay here indefinitely. There’s too much for me to see and to do. Yet, this is home.

This is the road I drove to school all those mornings. The street where I first learned how to ride a bike. That is the park where I’d skip school, go collect my thoughts and relax. There’s the Safeway I’d always go to on Sundays with TC. The swimming pool where I first worked up the nerve to take the plunge off the high board. The outdoor bars I spent so many late nights out partying with friends.

So much is held here: my beginning, and part of my middle. I can’t just forget that. Nor do I want to.

But … it’s still hard for me on some level when I am here. I feel torn, so many different emotions that grab hold of me and that sight of the National Monument, crossing over the Key Bridge, outline of The Kennedy Center, it never ceases — ever — to completely take my breath away. To have me so thankful that I grew up surrounded by world class museums and art and exhibits and discovery.

There’s a yearning. To be here, all the while knowing I am not meant for this place any longer.

Tell me you feel this way, too … that maybe this happens to you, as well … I want to know it’s not just me who is challenged coming home.