Returns are curious affairs. Like most things in our life they seem so much more magnificent in our own minds than they are in reality. By no means did I consider myself a returning Caesar. I had no visions of parades or red carpet welcomes but I must confess that my return has left me a bit dismayed.
Thoreau claimed "most men lived lives of quiet desperation." One always seems to create a fetish out of memory and expectation. Our reminisces are always fonder in mind than in practice. Our expectations of the future are always grander than what they in truth will become. Hope for something greater is upheld in the face of despair. One's hope and one's imaginary future is an easy handle to grasp in a foreign land, where possibilities might seem boundless.
Back at home, an Arkansan no longer abroad, reality has quickly settled in around me and this boundless future proves harder to find. As I navigate the pathways of normalcy, I slog on like Mr. Thomas, quietly raging against that dying light.
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