Once again something has come up that made me a little homesick for New York, although this time I'm actually glad I'm down here in Florida.
When I first saw this information on Facebook, I was on break at work just scrolling through my phone to pass the time. I couldn't believe what I was reading, because it didn't seem possible that this had happened in my own hometown. Then again, I remember when I was in 9th grade and a bank down the road from my house was robbed... we were all on lock down at school that day, and I heard that the same happened yesterday.
Reading about this robbery made me feel so many different emotions. It was scary; I used to go to that Dunkin Donuts all of the time! My former neighbor works there (luckily he wasn't there during the robbery though). My sister used to work at a diner next door to it. I literally passed that building every day of my life going to middle school and high school, and almost every other day after that. And since we've lived down here, I have found myself missing that exact same Dunkin Donuts because they made bagels much better up there than they do at or new local place.
I found myself wondering what we would have been doing had we still been living in our old house. I probably would have texted all of my friends to see if they had heard about it, and posted on Facebook, and shared the news with anyone who didn't live in my town because nothing exciting ever happened there (good or bad). It would have been all anyone could talk about for days. Instead, I didn't write anything about it. Sure, I came home from work and my mom asked if I had heard the news, but it was a brief discussion and then it was over. I didn't text anyone, or post about it, or comment on the news articles that others were sharing. It may have happened in my hometown, but it didn't involve me. I had nothing to do with it. I probably could have written how crazy it was, or how I couldn't believe that something like this could happen there, but I just felt like there was no point. It was such a weird feeling to not be involved in any way.
It's weird hearing about things that happen back in New York that prove to us just how life is moving on without us there. We've been living here for almost eight months now, and our lives are absolutely moving on in our new house. But you forget how life is moving on without you after you leave your old house. I saw a video online a few weeks ago of a flash mob in the mall that I used to go to all of the time, and I watched it just because I thought the location was cool. The flash mob had no effect on me; all I could focus on was the fact that the floors had been redone and were no longer the floors that I remembered. Stores are changing, the school year started without a Krigsman in the district for the first time in seventeen years, my friends are getting new jobs and taking new classes... It's strange to realize that we're not part of any of it.
Don't get me wrong now, I absolutely love living here in Florida. I love my new house, my new job, the beautiful weather... but I miss my friends, the familiar schools, the pediatricians' office, knowing where I was going when I drove to any of the surrounding towns without needing to rely on GPS. I almost wish that we could have moved my whole hometown down here to Florida, to keep everything exactly as it was, but relocate so that we could be warmer and I could work at Disney. I know, I'm crazy, but sometimes that seems like it would have been the perfect solution.
Anyway, I do hope that everything is alright back home and that they catch whoever held up the Dunkin Donuts. The incident may have had me reminiscing about living in New York, but I'm sure glad that I wasn't there during that whole fiasco!
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Taylor