Deja Smaug All Over Again

Blogging will be light over the weekend; Suanna and I are in Grand Rapids for a couple of baby showers. En route from the airport, we stopped by at my aunt and uncle’s place to borrow their old beater car while we’re in town. It doesn’t take me long to get back into West Michigan mode, but fresh off the plane as I was, it struck me as incredibly bizarre that someone would have an extra old car just laying around, with ample space to park it in and no problem with annual inspections or vehicle taxes.

As I slid behind the wheel, deja vu smacked me across the face, just as it did “not too long ago”:http://www.polytropos.org/archives/2003/07/deja_smaug.html. Not only did this old car _smell_ like the legendary Smaug, but it had the same huge plush front seat (none of this “bucket seat” crap) and grumbling engine. Cruising down Kalamazoo Avenue in it felt peculiar, to say the least. Mind you, this car didn’t have Smaug’s power, or the constant feeling that at any moment it might burst into flame and launch itself into the air, but it handled just like the old rig did.

Now I’m sitting in the familiar room that was mine through most of college, staring at the pile of baby clothes my mom has been gradually accumulating for her first grandchild. Time is pulling in both directions, and I’m caught in the middle, reminding myself that it’s not a dream.