I’m back in the mellow haze of Thanksgiving, that good tryptophan groove that starts after the dinner and then just gets better after the late evening round of turkey-stuffing-potatoes-gravy. This food-induced trip is part of an actually trip back to Fargo, where I’m spending a couple of days with mom, dad, and my oldest brother’s family, before returning to Minneapolis tomorrow. 

Before the feast began, I got quick run in to get primed for eating. As I unpacked my running cloths, I realized that I brought two different running shoes, my three-year-old pair of Asics and my one-year-old pair, so I ran unevenly through north Fargo, with one foot in the past and one in the present. I jogged around the old neighborhood, as I often do when I’m home, past the old house on Ninth Street, past Ben Franklin Jr. High, finally reading Fargo North high school on 17th Ave. The wind was blowing the light flurries of snow in my face as looped back toward home along 3rd Street, and as I cruised through the home stretch I began to feel an odd soreness in my left foot and tightness in my right leg, as if my body was having trouble adjusting to the mismatched shoes.

I’m always glad to be back in Fargo for whatever time I get, but this trip feel a bit short for reflection, for reconsidering my sense of Home, as I always do when I’m here. I flew into the Twin Cities on Tuesday, stayed over night with my other brother Jeff that night, drove with my other brother to Fargo Wednesday while watching movies in the Suburban, and then will drive back tomorrow. Shuttling between Boston, Minneapolis, and Fargo should be routine by now, and I guess I should appreciate the chance to touch base with these places on a fairly regular basis. But this time feels rushed, like I’m being slightly rude by glancing at my watch and excusing myself before we’ve really had a chance to catch up.