…But apparently I still take the long way down the Yellow Brick Road.

 

I’m taking a little pause from the “Change” series I’ve been working on. Not abandoning it entirely, but shelving it for a few days. Why? Because let’s be honest—those posts were starting to feel less like blog entries and more like dissertations, and my brain (and yours) deserves better.

 

Also, I’ve become, how shall I say this… a bit tangential.

 

> Tangential speech, according to Wikipedia (my go-to these days when I need to make sense of my brain), is a communication disorder in which the speaker’s thoughts wander off track and never quite return to the original point.

 

 

 

Welcome to my headspace.

 

While this has popped up now and then throughout my life, it’s really taken center stage since my strokes. And although I’m not in a state of psychosis or delirium (though that’s debatable before coffee), I have been assessed as having cognitive impairment—more accurately, brain injury.

 

Which… yep, that’s what a stroke is. Brain injury with flair.

 

Tangential speech isn’t new for me, but it’s gotten more pronounced. Combine it with a dash of PTSD (which has made eye contact a social sport I usually forfeit), a sprinkle of post-trauma introversion, and an emotional cocktail of feeling “forgotten” now that the crisis spotlight has dimmed—and boom. You get blogs like this. Wandering, heartfelt, self-reflective, and yes—sometimes a bit all over the place.

 

But that’s kind of the point.

 

I write this blog not for validation, but as a way to order the mental chaos. Working with AI helps give structure to my mental spaghetti. And let’s face it—it’s a healthier outlet than wandering around the house muttering to myself like a ghost in my own haunted sitcom.

 

 

—

 

Now… about not being in Kansas anymore.

 

Literally. I was born in Emporia, Kansas, but haven’t been back since the mid-1970s. After a short stint there, my family moved to Wichita, then to a little town called Medicine Lodge (yes, that’s a real place, not a Wild West saloon), and eventually to Manhattan—the Kansas one, not the one with Broadway and bagels.

 

After my parents divorced, my mom, my aunt, and I ended up in Clay Center, Kansas. That would be my last stop in the state. My mother, ever the determined provider, was a certified medical technologist who kept her credentials proudly displayed on our wall. My dad was a special education teacher, and at the time, quite in demand.

 

Jump to fall of 2023: I went back to Clay Center for what was technically my class’s 40th reunion. I didn’t graduate from there, but I did attend for a while, and one of my friends insisted I come.

 

At first, I had zero plans to go—mainly because my late husband would have lost his mind if I’d taken a solo trip like that. But after he passed and life took its surreal downward spiral, I decided: screw it. I needed something grounding. So I went.

 

And surprisingly, it helped.

 

I won’t lie—there was a heavy dose of awkwardness. If you’ve never moved to a small town as a kid, let me tell you: you’re not one of them. You’re not a local. You’re not known. And in junior high and high school, that lack of belonging is loud.

 

Add to that a sudden drop in income post-divorce. My mom and I were poor. Like, two-pairs-of-jeans poor. Most kids didn’t get picked on for repeating outfits. I did. And dirty jeans? That was automatic social exile. It didn’t help that I was embarrassed—and as a teenager, embarrassment breeds isolation like a Petri dish. I retreated. Deep.

 

But back to the reunion. It ended up being a bizarrely beautiful full-circle moment. I talked to classmates I never would’ve approached back then. Turns out, a lot of them actually liked me. They just didn’t know how to connect with the quiet, self-contained version of me. I didn’t give them much to work with.

 

I’m not moving back to Kansas, don’t worry. But returning to those spaces, seeing buildings frozen in time—like Clay Center’s Town Square, which looked exactly like it did the day I left—was oddly comforting. Like some parts of the past had just… waited for me to catch up.

 

It felt like closure. And it was a rare moment of clarity in a year that, frankly, had been chaos.

—

Some things I’m taking away from that trip:

People’s perceptions of us are often kinder than we think.

Embarrassment is a terrible reason to hide who you are.

Sometimes, healing comes from confronting the things you once ran from.

The person you were as a kid deserved more grace.

Your past can hold healing if you’re brave enough to go visit it.

Also—bonus round—I got to share this journey with my mom before she passed. We butted heads a lot over the years, especially about all the moving. And while I don’t have a tidy bow to wrap around all those years, I’m glad she knew I finally made peace with a part of our past.

—

So yes—I’m not in Kansas anymore.
But I did go back. And I’m better for it.

And if you’re in the middle of change, upheaval, or a strange new version of your life—try to be the person your dog and your mom hope you are. It’s not a bad place to start.