Lost at Home

Today about two hours after I got home from school I felt like I just needed to not be at home for a while, so I took my bike and my iPod, because I still haven't listened to all of the songs "Sigh No More" straight through, and I left even though it was cold.

And I mostly knew where I was going. I live in a fairly small town, and there's this place I sort of wanted to just go and sit and be for a while, but it's an area that's a distance away I'd never really been there in a way that wasn't by car. But recently I realised the link between the town centre and this place, and it wasn't like I was going to get lost.

So I started to cycle down one, straight road for about 10 minutes before I realised this wasn't the way and I'd taken a wrong turn when I looked around and thought about how I hadn't been here before. And suddenly I felt more scared and shaken than I have done in a long time - not because of the area; it was seemingly nice housing estate in broad daylight, there were people walking their golden labradors and things - but because this could've been anywhere, if you'd shown me a picture of this scene I couldn't recognise it as the town I grew up in.

I felt weirdly betrayed. I grew up here, I've lived in the same house for over half of my life, and it's so small and such a tight community that there shouldn't be bits of it I don't recognise or haven't seen. This town is where I sleep and eat and go to school and my friends live. It's sometimes a place I don't leave for weeks. How can it have all of me, when I don't know it anywhere as near as well as I thought?
I found what I was looking for, in the end, but I still feel weird about it. Maybe I need to go exploring.