Hometown Gig

There’s something about going home, isn’t there. Back to the place where you became. The bones are still there – the skeletons, and the frame. But the meat is different now. 

How can something be so utterly the same while also being undeniably different? How can those two states of being coexist on the same plane of existence? ​

You feel tenderly towards the home place that is no longer home. You feel like maybe you are actually alike, the two of you. Different but the same. 

And what of it, if everyone who made this place home has left? What if your mothers and fathers all packed their bags and left it, left you, before you could leave it... them...? What then?

It used to be that I couldn’t visit Brighton without being inundated by the gap between what was and what is. The void seemed unfillable, inescapable. Around every corner was loss, because, well, there was so much there to lose in the first place. The bones jutted through the skin and rubbed the new facades raw until the paint peeled and curled away.

It’s different now but don’t ask me why this time the same places feel different. Something about sharing them with someone who understands you to your core, someone who can keep you safe and hold you through the rattling void so that it doesn’t feel like a chasm anymore – the void is just a place where you can go without touching the edges of anything, and that can be quite lovely if you think about it.