Omaha



I would hide under the furniture, too.

This is where I was baptised. This is where I started kindergarten. This is where my father was stationed while he was serving in the Air Force. This is where my mother and siblings and I lived for the year that he was in Thailand serving as a surgeon during the Vietnam War.

It is beautiful here, but I am afraid. Afraid of the past. Afraid of the memories rushing in too powerfully. Afraid of not remembering accurately, of making up stories about who I might have been if things had been otherwise after my father came home.

But mainly I am afraid of the magic that I felt as we drove over the hills into this city of which I have only scattered, little kid memories. This is the first stop on our great Road Trip west. Can it rekindle the magic for me?

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