Cocoa and Caffeine Hollywood Travels: "You picked the wrong time to come to Omaha," my brother says...

Friday, December 14, 2007

"You picked the wrong time to come to Omaha," my brother says...

One way in which you can manipulate time and space is by re-visiting the place in which you grew up.

In a way, it's like entering another dimension. For me, that place is Omaha.

Though I spent the majority of my life there, it feels like a world away. Warm in a familiar, deja vu way, but cold in a way that whispers in your ear that you don't really fit--not so much--anymore.

Tomorrow, I'll fly there. I'll pack up as little as humanly possible, yet enough to get by, and hope to hell that there are lots and lots of heavy winter coats and sweaters and mittens to get me through. My own brother says, "You picked the wrong time to come to Omaha," as though I needed such positive encouragement.

After six years of L.A. winters, I'm not looking forward to freezing, nor am I really prepared. My Omaha treks usually occur in September~ for a reason. The current Omaha weather forecast alone is enough to make me cry, and the idea of existing in that climate for several days is enough to make me wear the ugliest, embroidered, hand-me-down, thrift shop Christmas sweater there is. (I don't care what I look like; I just want to be warm.)

And that's the beauty of it. When you go back to your hometown, nobody really cares what you look like--they're just glad to see you. And that warmth and familiarity will melt just about anything, except for maybe my holiday spirit.

Home may be where the heartland is... but it's certainly not where the sun is. This is what I'm flying into. Yup, the holidays will make you do crazy things.

OMAHA, NEBRASKA WEATHER FORECAST (12/15/07 and onward...)

ACCUWEATHER SIX-DAY FORECAST